Their Cross To Bear
by RJF
Summary: Complete. Sequel To United As Three. As the Charmed Ones prepare for their final battle, the rest of the families have wars of their own to deal with. Read to see how it all comes to an end in this final piece of the trilogy.
1. Here Once More

Well, here it is, "Their Cross To Bear" The third in my series. I hope you're going to enjoy this as much as you have the other stories, and if you're just beginning to read, there's a summary of the first two in my profile, along with pictures of all the characters. I will be adding a short summary for this story in time.

Replies –

Ravenix – Well, I don't know how long with series is going to run for, probably until I feel it's the right time to end it. I dunno. And I thought Thor would a surprise! I'm glad you liked it, and you'll need to wait and see about Emma ;) Thanks for taking the time to review!

Princess Pinky – Lol, yeah. Pam really should know better than to try and run away without a goodbye. And thanks, I try to make the descriptions as real as possible, as they're usually important to the scene. I thought a pentacle would be a good thing to do because it's a little bit of 'real' magic if you know what I mean. And oh yes, you'll be seeing more of Lorna _and_ Emma. ;)

Fanmania – Thanks, and yeah I figured that the Paige/Aidan chapter would be most people's favourite. Lol.

ColePhoebe4eva – Thanks! I had to do something great to finish the story, didn't I? Lol, I'm glad you liked it!

Prince Halliwell – Oh, Phoebe will definitely feel the worst about being made to forget about Connor. Heh, you actually won't have to wait that long for Emma :P and you'll find out about Piper story progresses.

Chyp – Thanks, and your welcome, lol.

Phoebe turner – Yeah, the entire world was made to forget about him, but that won't last… hopefully. Thanks for reviewing!

Lindsay – That's okay, school's been hell for me too. Thanks for taking the time to review!

Character's Ages and Powers:

**Piper Halliwell Wyatt** – _36_ - Temporal Stasis, Molecular Acceleration, Imperviousness, Intangibility, Invisibility, Geokinesis

**Phoebe Halliwell Mulwray** – _34_ – Clairvoyance, Levitation, Empathy, Telepathy, Telempathy, Psionic Blasts

**Paige Matthews** – _32_ – Orbing, Telekinetic Orbing, Healing, Telekinesis, Astral Projection, MDS (Multi-Dimensional Sight).

**Brennan Mulwray** –_36_ – Electrokinesis, Jet Propulsion, Electrical Field Generation.

**Leo Wyatt** – _Age Unknown _– Orbing, Electrokinesis, Healing, Self-Healing, Levitating, Various Divine Abilities.

**Emma DeLauro** – _31_ – Unknown

**Pamela Walker** – _20_ – Advanced Telekinesis, Molecular Acceleration, Cryokinesis, Clairvoyance, Possession, Astral Pulsation.

**Wyatt Matthew Halliwell** – _8_ – Orbing, Thought Projection, Healing, Telekinetic Orbing, Full Extent Of Powers Unknown.

**Christopher Perry Halliwell** – _6_ – Orbing, Telekinesis, Molecular Acceleration.

**Connor Halliwell Mulwray** – _3 years 6 months_ – Electrical Field Generation, Electrokinesis, Full Extent Of Powers Unknown.

**Melinda Parker Matthews** – _2 years 9 months_ – Orbing, Telekinetic Orbing, Orb Shield Generation.

**Emma Parker Matthews** – _2 years 9 months_ – Splashing, Telekinetic Splashing, Water Shield Generation.

**Lorna Thorughway** – _2 years 3 months_ – Full Extent Of Powers Unknown.

**Here Once More…**

Phoebe stared blankly out towards the dark and dank street she lived on. Her view was being impaired by the drops of water that would occasionally drip down the glass from the lashings of rain that the window had had to endure over the past two weeks. This weather was strange, as they were supposed to be on the brink of summer, so that fact that it had been depressingly wet for the past few weeks was starting to make people panic about global warming, which Phoebe thought was completely moronic. The weather is unpredictable, they just couldn't handle it.

It had been around a year since Brennan had first left with Doctors Without Borders. Phoebe had seen him a total of six times during the twelve months, and it was usually for around two weeks at a time. It may have been enough for some people, but for Phoebe, who had to come home to this big empty house every night, it wasn't. She couldn't even remember why they had gone for much a big house when it was just the two of them, they had tried to have children, but to no avail. Phoebe figured it was probably better this way, as it would have been hard to cope with a child without Brennan here.

Her eyes wondered along the sidewalk on the other side of the road before something caught her attention. There was a small figure sitting on the curb. Phoebe squinted her eyes, trying to get a better look. From she could tell, the small boy seemed to be hugging his knees, his facial features were completely covered by the messy black hair that stuck to his scalp in the rain. Anger began to make her heart pound faster, what kind of sick parent would leave their child outside on a day like this?

In an instant, she had flung on her jacket and had grabbed a thick blanket from the towel closet upstairs. She opened the front door, rain bouncing off the brick path that led through the front lawn and into the house. Having a quick look around, Phoebe crossed the road, a pang of sympathy hitting her heart when she saw the boy was rocking back and forth.

"Hey, sweetie. Where are your Mommy and Daddy?" She asked kindly, kneeling down and going to put the blanket over the boy's shoulders. But as soon as the blanket was about to make contact, the child just vanished, letting the baby blue cover fall to the wet sidewalk. "What the…" She was about to inspect further, when she noticed Mrs. Hunter staring at her from across the street, reluctantly walking the dog her son had dumped on her while he took his family to Cuba for a vacation. He had wanted to get away from the rain apparently, and being one of best lawyers in the city, he could easily just up and go at any time.

Phoebe made a smile to the woman who had just saw her seemingly talk to herself, before stuffing the blanket under her arm and walking hurriedly back to the house, thoroughly confused by the situation and not hearing the small whimper in the wind.

"_Mommy…"

* * *

_

Pamela groaned, hitting her head off the apartment door as she closed it. "I hate men." She announced to her roommate Jordann, who was sitting on the couch, flicking through channels on the television while licking what was left of mint ice cream off her fingers. The hare feral turned out, moving a strand of her blonde-brown hair from her eyes as she smirked at Pamela smacking her head off the door.

"I take it you had a bad date?" She asked, leaping over the back of the sofa and folding her arms as her friend turned around. Jordann lent on the back of the couch, ready for the rant that was undoubtedly about to erupt.

"My date?" She repeated with a wry chuckle, "Ugh, he got _way_ too busy with his hands, so I pulled the cramps card and sent him packing. I swear to God, the men in this damn city must be in heat at this time of year. My ass got pinched three times on the way out of my Media Ethics lecture yesterday, I'm sure one of them was even the professor!"

"Good thing he doesn't teach Ethics in the Work Place, then he'd be really bad at his job." Jordann quipped, walking across to the open plan kitchen with an empty carton of ice cream in her head. She put her foot down on the pedal; making the trash can lid flip up and allow her to drop the rubbish in.

"Cram it, Jord." Pamela snapped, before throwing her purse to the sofa and sighing, "Listen, that last thing I want to do on a Friday night is sit and do one of many essays I have due next week…" She droned bitterly, before her face brightened, "Why don't we just do what we always do every time one of us has a bad date?"

"Do tequila shots on the roof and bitch about the gaping maw of ass that is our love lives?" Jordann inquired with a frown, cocking her head and reminding Pamela of her Aunt Piper with that one movement.

"Actually, I was thinking we could eat everything in sight and watch horrific re-runs of 'Beverly Hills 90210', but your idea is better and involves me dulling the pain of this evening through alcohol…" Her face fell all of a sudden, "But didn't we drain every drop at the end of year party at the start of the summer?"

"Aw… crap, we did." Jordann said in an equally saddened tone, before perking up, "Okay, I'll nip to the store across the street and get some. I'll meet you on the roof." She grabbed a ten dollar bill from a glass bowl on the counter that was filled with a considerable amount of money. Both the young women contributed to this amount so that they could pay for groceries, rent, and various bills.

"Alright, I'm gonna get out of this outfit. It reeks of perv." Pamela announced as she walked down the hallway that led to the rest of the spacious apartment.

She opened the door to her room, which was bathed in a soft inviting glow as a dim light shone on her nightstand. Luckily for Pamela, she had managed to get the bedroom that was at the front of building, granting her a spectacular view of the beautiful city that she had lived within the past year, which, at this point in time, was an intricate maze of moving lights, broken only by the white, blue and red lights that shone proudly on the Empire State Building..

She never would have been able to get such a nice place to stay if it hadn't been for Cassy, as this apartment was actually part of the mutant underground. It had been initially designed for younger mutants that needed to be close to schools to get their education, but Adam realized that most of the mutants that Genomex created were now in their twenties or thirties and had no need to be close to the university. There were a few who did need protection, however. Jordann was a prime example, as her mother had passed her powers onto her; Pamela just took up room that would be wasted if she didn't live there.

Silently, the weary witch grabbed her pajamas from a drawer and began to change, offering a small smile to the picture of her little cousins that stood upon her chest of drawers, Wyatt, Chris, the twins, and Lorna, each of whom had grown immensely since the picture had been taken. Little did Pamela know that there was one missing, one that had been missing for a long time, one that should have been in that photo, and that one precious life was something she didn't even realize was gone

* * *

"Aw… Dammit…" Piper cursed lowly, staring up at the dark storm cloud filled sky and grimacing. She let out a more colourful curse word as the brown paper bag fell from her grasp as she tried to open out her umbrella, silently wishing she had asked for plastic bags.  
Luckily, the tiles underneath the shop's outer canopy weren't wet from the rain, so Piper was able to retrieve the various items that had fallen from the bag without them being damaged or dirty. Letting out a yelp, the witch threw out her hands, freezing the rude man who had been standing behind her in the queue. He was about to lay a footprint into one of the roots of ginger that Piper had purchased. She shot her hand out, grabbing the beige ingredient and shoving it back into the paper bag.

Once she had recovered everything, Piper went back to opening her umbrella, shaking it vigorously on the tiled entrance and soaking the floor as water flew from the material. She swung the umbrella merrily onto her shoulder and walked off, unfreezing the man and not hearing him yelp with pain as he slipped and fell on the wet tiles that she had created.

Piper huffed as her cell phone began to ring shrilly and vibrate within her jacket, tickling her abdomen and making her smile. The juggling commenced yet again, as she held the handle of her umbrella within the crook between her neck and shoulder before delving into her pocket and yanking out her cell phone. "What?" She snapped rudely into the receiver, trying to make sure her umbrella didn't get caught in the next gust of wind.

"It's always such a pleasure talking to you, I wonder why I don't call you more often." Paige sassily retorted on the other end of the line, knowing exactly how to get under her eldest sister's skin.

"Hold that thought." Piper replied, planting the paper bag on the soaking hood of her car, not caring that the items at the bottom of the bag were probably ruined now. She quickly closed her umbrella and threw it into the back seat as soon as she opened the door, before grabbing the grocery bag and stuffing it onto the passenger seat before finally getting herself into the vehicle.

"Can I talk now?" Paige's amplified voice came through the phone after Piper had placed it in the hands free device.

"Fire away!" Piper said enthusiastically, reaching into the back seat for her purse and pulling down the mirror from the roof. She decided to check her make-up while her younger sister talked, as Piper didn't feel confident driving on a wet day while trying to concentrate on a conversation with Paige at the same time.

"I was calling to ask if there's anything you want us to bring to tonight's little gathering." Paige replied. There was a crackling noise before the witchlighter's muffled voice could be heard; she had obviously covered the receiver, "Melinda! Don't you dare draw on that sofa!" She ordered, making Piper smile at the thought of nieces causing trouble again.

"Um…" Piper pulled out a lipstick from her purse, twisting it up and applying it in front of the mirror. "Wine." She finally replied, "Wine is always a good thing, and I don't think we have any in house, so…"

"Okay then, wine- Emma! Put that down!" Paige snapped to her other daughter, before a muffled smash was heard along with a bark of irritation from Sandy, who, as always, was just looking to get some sleep. "Ugh! Do the terrible twos _ever_ end? I swear to God, these little demons run circles around the Elvin nanny, around me… Aidan is the only one they actually behave for…"

"Honey, it'll all die down in a couple of months, trust me. Wyatt and Chris didn't really grow out of it until they were three! And you remember what a hell that was a live with. Mel and Emma are just very energetic." Piper explained in a sweetly patronizing tone, she wasn't the only one who knew how to annoy a sibling. "I'm just glad I won't have to go through it again."

There was a snort of laughter on the other end of the line, "Uh, s'cuse me, but are you forgetting about that little two year old redhead that happens to be in your care? Once Lorna starts up, I'll be the one who's laughing!"

Piper pursed her lips before grinning inanely with maternal pride, "I don't think so. Lorna's a little angel and you know it. The only time she was a complete nightmare was when Emma…" The witch trailed off, tucking the lipstick back in her purse. Even after eighteen months of it happening, it was still hard to talk about the demise of their friend.

"Well, I guess this is one thing that Phoebe doesn't have to endure. Makes you think that she's lucky, huh?" Paige made a pathetic attempt to change the subject.

This was a topic that saddened Piper even more, "To be honest, I think that she would love everything about being a mom, even the stuff that's made us want to orb our kids down to Purgatory for the day just to get some peace."

"At least we can be thankful that Brennan didn't get her pregnant then leave for months on end. Can you imagine the wreck that she would have been if he had done that?" The youngest Charmed One said with a hint of disgust. At first, she had supported Brennan's to join Doctors Without Borders, but as she noticed the decline in her sister's happiness, her support slowly began to wane.

Piper grinned at that remark, shaking her head and grabbing her car keys off the dashboard. She had thrown them up there as soon as entering the vehicle, "How quickly you forget, Missy Paige. You were in the very same position you just described, once upon a time, and did you see Phoebe treating Aidan like crap when he came back? In fact, the only one that _did_ treat him like crap was you."

"With good reason, I-," Mischievous giggles were heard, before one of the twins shouted "Det doggy!" An angry sigh from Paige made the phone line crackle before she replied, "Ugh, Piper, I gotta go. Emma just splashed Sandy out onto the balcony in the pouring rain. I'll see you tonight."

"Okay." Piper replied with a smirk, "Good luck!" She hollered, before hanging up and turning her keys in the ignition, still smiling as she drove off when the sudden image of Paige having to wash Sandy entered her mind.

* * *

Pamela took in a relieved breath as she stepped out onto the roof. She was immediately met with the sounds of sirens, car honks, and just the sound of regular traffic on a busy New York Friday. The view from here was even better than the one she got from her bedroom. This was one of the many reasons Pamela loved to live in Manhattan, there was always something now to spot, a new restaurant, a new club, a new department store, a new billboard in Time Square, it was an ever-changing city.

She had lived here for a few years as a child when she was with the Walkers. Her time with them and her time with her blood family were probably the two happiest periods of her life, the times where she had felt safe and had not felt the need to always be watching her back. It was no way for someone to have to grow up, to have to fend for themselves on the streets half the time and spending the rest of the time robbing people just for some change.

The witch walked up the small staircase that led to a large silver funnel which was situated on a platform. Nor Pamela or Jordann had bothered to figure out what it was, they just assumed it was part of the air duct system and left it at that. Pamela's ears twitched, she could hear something. It sounded like the gentle strumming of someone playing a guitar. She walked around the funnel, the music getting louder as she did, before she found the source of the sound.

Pamela couldn't see his face. Whoever this man was he was crouched over the acoustic guitar, watching and making sure that his fingers were plucking the right strings. But it wasn't just the fact that he had his head bowed, shaggy brown hair hung over his eyes, concealing most of his appearance from the young woman that was watching him. Pamela was mesmerized by the calming music he was creating, and was slightly disappointed when it came to an end.

"It's rude to stare, you know." A deep voice said with an amused tone from under the thick mane of hair. The man looked up, and immediately Pamela was taken aback by the striking blue of his eyes, they almost seemed to glow under the curtain of hair. She could only imagine how bright they would if his hair wasn't in the way.

"Oh… I wasn't… I mean… I was just…" Pamela stuttered, her mouth opening and closing rapidly as for once she was speechless, "Alright, I have no alibi." She smiled, earning a boyish grin from the man as he went back to his guitar, "You play beautifully…" She added hoarsely, sitting down and attempting to hide the fact that she was in her pajamas.

"Thanks." He replied, deciding to just let his fingers glide across the strings instead of creating music, "You play an instrument?"

Pamela sneered to herself as she hesitated with an answer, "Um… I used to play the piano when I was a little girl. My foster mom would teach me every Sunday morning. But I gave it up."

"Shame on you." He replied, shaking his head in a manner of mock shame before going back to plucking at the strings of his guitar, running a hand through his shaggy hair and giving Pamela a glimpse of his eyes without any barriers in front of him. She had been right, they were so striking that she knew that he was the kind of person that was hard to keep eye contact with.

Pamela tapped her fingers off her knee, bowing her head in sorrow, "Well, after my foster mom died, I just didn't have the motivation or will to seek out other ways to learn, so…" She caught a look from him that swelled with regret about his previous comment, "It's okay, you didn't know. And you're right, I should've kept playing. It would have done my foster mom proud."

"What was her name?" The mystery man asked, now doing everything possible to avoid eye contact until the uncomfortable period caused by his callous had passed, "Did she play the piano for a living?"

Pamela frowned, curious, "Um… Yeah, she did, her name was Joanne Walker. How did you know she played the piano for a living?"

He smiled, "Because when I was little, around… seven or eight, my dad, who was a big hotshot business man at the time, he's retired now…" He quickly added in before going back to his story, "Anyway, he was always dragging me and my brother around the world, although New York was where we usually ended up staying. We would always stay in the same hotel, I think it's been demolished now, and in the hotel, there was this woman who would play the piano beautifully in the bar. She would always buy me and my brother a soda when we came down for lunch… And she told us to call her Jojo; she was a sort of motherly figure since my mom died when giving birth to me…"

The young woman smiled, memories of her deceased foster mother coming into her mind, "She would tell me and my foster brother to call her Jojo. I think it was because, although she loved us like her own, she wanted us to know that we came from somewhere else…"

He smiled back as Pamela shared that information, "I guess she did that with me for the same reason…"

The two sat in silence for a few moments, before Pamela suddenly let out a laugh, grinning, "Oh God, I'm Pamela by the way." She introduced herself, holding out her hand. The man grinned in return, taking her hand and opening his mouth, about to reveal his name, before Jordann's voice suddenly cut through the air sharply.

"Pam! You up here?"

"Yeah! I'm with-," She turned back to the man to ask his name. But before she had been moved her head back around, a gust of wind blew her hair into her eyes and by the time she had cleared her sight, he was, inexplicably, gone. "No one…" She finished her sentence, looking around wildly.

Jordann came around the funnel, grinning widely as she held a tall bottle of tequila and two shot glasses, "Ten bucks says that we'll be so hammered by the end of this little session that we'll fall down the stairs back into the building!" She said cheerfully, before noticing Pamela swirl her head around back and forth, "Are you having a stroke or something?"

The young woman swirled her head around, glaring at the hare feral, "No." She replied flatly, "There was a guy here… I was having…" She laughed wryly, "One of the nicest conversations I've had with a guy in ages…"

Jordann merely raised an eyebrow in response, "Um… Honey, when you start to hallucinate guys and have full blown conversations with them, it's time to get laid." She said in a condescending tone before plopping to the ground and twisting open the bottle, "You wanna go first? I've got lemons!" She announced, holding up a bag of lemon slices and holding up a shaker of salt.

Pamela sighed, finally giving up and holding out her shot glass, "Fill'er up!" She commanded, her mind beginning to wonder back to trying to figure out where her mystery man had gone, as she certainly hadn't dreamt him up like Jordann had suggested. She wasn't _that_ desperate.

Well, she hoped she wasn't.

* * *

"Okay…" Paige began as she walked slowly into the kitchen, carrying quite a large stack of plates and bowls, "I think that's all of them, unless the guys took their desserts into the front room to watch the baseball highlights." She set the china down on the counter, wiping her hands together and sighing, "My God, we're pigs, how can four people go through so much food? Maybe it's a good thing Phoebe couldn't make it after all; there would have been nothing for her to eat."

"Actually, I predicted she'd pull a stunt like this…" Piper said smugly as she ran hot water into the sink, filling it so she could begin the clean up, "I've got some food in the oven that I can reheat for when she shows up, which should be any minute,"

The youngest Charmed One raised an eyebrow at her older sister as she jumped up to sit on the counter, grabbing a towel and drying off any wet dishes Piper handed to her, "You lost me at the word 'stunt'. What are you talking about?"

"Haven't you noticed that she's always found some sort of excuse to get out of anything that involves us all meeting as a family?" Piper asked quizzically, passing Paige a dish and looking out the window, where rain was still pelting against the glass in a vicious manner.

Her younger sister's brow creased in thought, "Um… Actually, yeah, like when she didn't show up at Wyatt's eighth birthday a few months ago. Well, she came when it was only me and you left."

"Exactly." Piper replied, "I mean, you remember the sadness you felt when you had to go back to that big apartment all alone when you were pregnant. I think that Phoebe's feeling the same thing."

"I don't think she's feeling anything right now… She's just empty." Paige answered bleakly, catching a glimpse of headlights from the window as a car came up the driveway slightly, "Hmm… Speak of the psionic." She smirked, moving the net curtain slightly just in time to see Phoebe running up the drive and head for the back door. As the middle Charmed One opened the door, a gust of wind blew through the room from the opening, disturbing a few of the pictures that Lorna had had been drawing at the table and making them flap about in the air.

"Phew! Sorry!" Phoebe replied meekly, closing the door and entering the kitchen. Piper noticed a flicker of relief on her sister's face when she saw both of her siblings. The eldest Halliwell immediately knew that Phoebe was glad to not be in the presence of two happy couples.

"You missed dinner." Piper greeted, drying her hands quickly with a towel and proceeding to try and catch Lorna's drawings, which were still flapping around. "But…" Her hand shot out, grabbing a picture that was supposed to be of her, Leo and the kids, and stuck it to the refrigerator with a smile, "… I've got some leftovers that I can heat up for you if you want."

Phoebe whipped her scarf off, draping it over a chair at the table before smiling, "Oh no, I'm fine. I'm really sorry for being late, deadlines and all!" She grinned kindly, not aware that her wisdom teeth were clearly exposed as she did. "Oh, you missed one." Phoebe announced, kneeling down and retrieving a picture from the ground, "Who are these people supposed to be?"

Piper quickly glanced at crayon drawing that her sister was holding up, "Um… That is you and Brennan, by the looks of the hair." She replied, pointing at the scribbles of black and brown crayon above the stick figures' heads.

Phoebe turned it back around as she could look at it, frowning at the third figure in the drawing, "Who's the kid standing in between us?" She asked casually, turning it to Piper once again, who merely shrugged.

"Dunno." Piper shrugged, not really paying attention anymore as she covered any leftovers in foil and shoved them into the refrigerator, "Maybe Lorna has some hopes for you and Brennan." She joked, smiling.

At this, the middle Charmed One let out a laugh, "Yeah, well, with my husband living in Pakistan almost all year round, my chances of having any kids are not so good." She sat down slowly at the table, looking at the picture, "Besides, this kid looks like a boy, and I didn't see a boy in my vision three years ago."

"_Mommy!"_

Phoebe suddenly felt her chest tighten with a heart wrenching pain, causing her to gasp in pain as a tidal wave of sorrow and fear crashed into her. But it wasn't her own; she was feeling someone else's emotions through her powers. It was so strong, so familiar that it almost reduced Phoebe to tears instantly as blood pounded in her ears from the intensity of the experience. She was grateful when the searing heat in her chest resided, but she was also angry at herself for not being able to bear it longer, as she had been so close to figuring out whatever had passed through her…

"Are you okay?" Paige immediately asked, jumping down from the counter to rush to her sister's aid. Piper sat down next to her little sister, taking her hand and trying to catch her eyes as they just looked down at the floor, trying to process what she had just experienced.

"Pheebs…?" The eldest Charmed One murmured, squeezing her sibling's hand reassuringly. Phoebe's head suddenly shot up, she flashed a grin at both of her sisters, tapping Piper's hand with her free one and making her smile widen even further before standing up, dragging Piper up with her and looking around.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

* * *

Phoebe cautiously turned the doorknob, wincing at the groan the old door made as she slowly pushed it open. Remembering to step over the very first floorboard in the room as it was creaky; she took quite a large step in, avoiding the creaky wood beneath her feet. This had been her room for six years before joining Mutant X after all; she knew all the creaks and noises that went on within its walls.

It had changed drastically to how the middle Charmed One had once lived in it however, as it had stopped being a shrine to Emma's memory shortly after they vanquished Satanos, allowing room for belongings that Lorna could make her own memories with. The walls, once covered with extremely dated wallpaper, had now been painted with a fresh, clean looking lilac. Instead of the large oak dresser that Phoebe had once used to store everything she needed, there was a smaller white dresser. Paige had painted on its doors, painting half of a cartoon sun on one door, and painting half of a cartoon moon on the other.

This was just one sign of Lorna's peculiar maturity. She had packed away her toys into large storage boxes under her bed before going to sleep, which, for a child of two and three months, was a miracle all on itself. There was only one toy that Phoebe could see lying out. She assumed that it couldn't fit under the bed, as this doll house seemed to be quite large and yet again, was neat and tidy. Phoebe smiled, apart from the unnerving tidiness it was just a normal little girl's room.

She almost regretted what she was about to do, as she remembered the crankiness of Wyatt when Piper had woken him up during the night to take his temperature as a small child when he had the flu. He had nearly howled the house down, but something told the psionic that Lorna wasn't that kind of child.

Sitting down on the edge of the small bed, Phoebe was entranced by the spinning light on kiddy nightstand. It set a warm glow across the room, as the piece of plastic that spun around the bulb projected star shapes on lilac walls. It was just the sort of thing Phoebe expected from her sister to give Lorna on a miserable, stormy night like this. The nightlight would be sure calm down any child, since the stars, although surrounded by darkness, shine brightly in the sky, fighting away the inky black shadows that most children were afraid of.

Phoebe gently laid her hand on a slumbering Lorna's shoulder, hesitating for a few seconds before, as gently as she could, shaking the little redhead out of her sleep. Her tranquil green eyes fluttered open, balling one of her tiny fists and rubbing one of her eyes innocently. Lorna's bleary gaze set upon the woman that had become like an aunt to her.

"Hey, Lorny…" Phoebe whispered delicately, smiling at the little girl who had now sat up in her bed crossed her legs, narrowing her eyes at the middle Charmed One curiously.

"Auntie Pheeb, watcha doin' hewe? Pipew says that I shood be sleepin'." The little girl asked. Lorna was unbelievably intelligent for her age. She had picked up walking quickly, before moving onto learning words. It was only a few months after her first word that the tiny psionic has forming full coherent sentences.

Phoebe responded by tapping Lorna gently on the nose and smiling, "This is just our little secret, okay? And you have to go back to sleep straight after this, promise?" She asked firmly, staring into Lorna's eyes before earning a vigorous nod in response.

"Kay! Pwomise!"

The middle Charmed One grinned, before reaching into her back pocket and unfolding the piece of paper, revealing that it was the drawing of her, Brennan and the mystery child, "Honey… See the kid in the picture? Who is that?" She asked calmly, pointing to the smallest of the three stick figures.

Lorna's eyes widened in surprise before she giggled, "Dat's Connow, silly!" She shot Phoebe a grin, confusing her anymore, "He your and Bwennan's!" She added another detail. The middle Halliwell narrowed her eyes suspiciously at the picture, turning it back around and not understanding.

"Lorna, I don't… I don't have a son. I don't have any kids." Phoebe said slowly, laying a hand on the redhead's small knee and giving her a sympathetic smile as if she had just crushed the child's belief in everything good in her life.

But this was returned in an equally patronizing manner when Lorna shot Phoebe a knowing smile that showed wisdom far beyond her years, "G'night!" She said enthusiastically, shuffling back under the covers while giggling. "Silly Auntie Pheeb…" Lorna muttered to herself, pulling her "My Little Pony" covers up around her and closing her eyes.

"Um… Yeah… Good night, sweetie…" The Charmed One replied softly but uncertainly, stroking the little girl's auburn locks until Lorna slowly and peacefully drifted off to sleep. "You're so special…" Phoebe whispered, pressing a button on the nightlight and lowering the harshness of the glow before getting up and heading out of the door, glancing one more time at the little redhead as she closed it exited.

Lorna's eyes flashed open as soon as Phoebe had gone. She pushed back her covers and put her hand against her left temple. Her tiny forehead creased in thought before her head shone with an unearthly white, stretching her abilities as far as they would go and throwing her deep red hair away from her face in a psychic wind.

Connor would be returned before midnight, and she would make sure of it.

* * *

Piper walked slowly into the attic with her arms folded and sighed at the sight. Phoebe had once again ducked the company or her and Paige, retreating to the top floor of the house and preferring to spend her time in the house with the Book of Shadows. It was at times like this that Piper, more than anything in the world, wanted to do something to cure her sister's loneliness and return her to her true self.

Phoebe placed both hands on smooth midnight blue cover of the tome that had begun everything all those years ago, a reassuring rush of power going through her as she made contact with the book. The metallic triquetra gleamed proudly in the centre of the front, a symbol of sisterly strength and the Power of Three. Unaware of her older sister's presence, Phoebe began to open the Book of Shadows, the spine creaking slightly as she did. It wasn't used to being opened, as they hadn't needed to touch it in a year.

"Don't let me down…" The psionic Charmed One whispered to no one in particular as she began flicking through the pages slowly and gently, wanting it to be only time that would ever damage this beautiful artifact. Inaudible whisperings suddenly entered Phoebe's mind as she telempathically connected with the book, continuing to turn the pages at a delicate rate before stopping at one. Smiling, she grabbed one of the velvety black tassels that hung from the top of the spine, markers for pages, and slid it onto the page before closing the book, "Thank you…" She whispered, running her hand quickly across the silver Wiccan symbol in the centre before stuffing it under her arm and heading for the door, before she noticed Piper standing there.

"Uh… Hi, I was just coming to get you and Paige." Phoebe began, walking back to the altar and opening the Book of Shadows at where she had just marked. "Could you go get her, please? We have some work to do." She announced, grabbing a pad and pen from the side of the altar and using the information on the page to form a spell.

"What kind of work?"

"The kind that lets me find out what's been missing in my life for the past year!" She snapped, "Paige!" Phoebe yelled into the air, hoping that the whitelighter side of her younger sister would allow her to hear her call, or she could just hear her from the kitchen.

Orbs swarmed into a tall cloud of light, disappearing and leaving Paige in their place as she materialized. Her eyes darted around the room, thinking that the urgent call for her presence had meant a demon attack. She frowned at her sisters, who were in the middle of a heated glance, "Any reason for the shrieking?" The witchlighter snapped at both of them.

"We're casting a spell." Phoebe replied.

"No, we're not!" Piper threw back, her eyes widening to emphasize her order. She refused to let Phoebe ruin the year long break they had had from magic and all the baggage that came along with being witches.

"Don't you want to me to happy?"

The eldest witch rolled her eyes, stomping her foot off the floor impatiently; "Don't you dare play that card with me, Missy. It didn't work when I caught you sneaking out the house in the eighth grade and it won't work now." Her head spun to the left, glaring at her baby sister, "Aren't you going to back me up on this?"

"Uh… Sure, as long as you tell me what I'm supposed to be yelling at her for…" Paige answered uncertainly, not even why there was such tension between her two siblings.

"Piper, it won't work if there's nothing to find so I really don't see what your big problem is!" Phoebe spat back, ripping a piece of paper from the pad roughly in frustration before walking around the Book of Shadows and folding her arms defensively.

"Because it is still magic! It is usage of our powers, something that we've been trying to limit! And if demons think we're using magic, they might think that it's some sort of preparation for a vanquishing spree!" Piper countered, "And I don't want to bring that same unnecessary danger into our lives again!"

"I think you're being a little over dramatic! Paige just orbed in, she used her powers, and you were telling me about the jerk you froze in Chinatown today. That's two times…" Phoebe held up two fingers, "… That you guys have used your powers today, and I don't see any demons!"

"But you want us to use the Power of Three. That is some serious magic."

"Look, I can reword this so I can do this alone, or you can help me… You guys, I'm doing this whether I have your support or not, so…" She ripped two more pages from the pad, handing one each to Piper and Paige and giving them a few seconds to process what was on the paper, "Will you help me?"

The eldest and youngest both shared a look. Neither of them wanted to do this, this was an unneeded risk. Even if the spell didn't work, their magic could still be detected and if the demons were to attack them, it would ruin the perfect normality of the lives that Piper and Paige had been living for the past year. But they realized that, while they had been living their dreams, Phoebe had been left in the dust, living in a large house all by herself and being unable to stand her own sisters happiness because she was so miserable.

Paige sighed, changing her stance slightly and pushing Piper into place so that the three of them were standing as the corners of a triangle, "Let's do this…" She murmured reluctantly, happy to see a grin shine on Phoebe's face before shooting a glare at her eldest sibling, "Piper…"

Piper didn't respond at all, just quickly catching Paige's glance before taking a deep breath, signifying that she was ready to begin chanting the spell. Her sisters followed suit, the three of them speaking with uneasy tones, "A faded memory, now a withering haze, It haunts us now, through all our days, Take us now, through the endless space, And return what was lost to its rightful place…"

An odd sensation rushed through the three witches, making them feel as if their insides were being churned around. Their temples were throbbing, along with their throats, as they all seemed to be suppressing the urge to vomit at that moment. Suddenly, their view of what was in front of them went extremely out of focus, and when it came back, all three had changed.

Nothing in the room seemed to have changed however; the storm was still raging outside, the rain making a racket on the stain glass window and the wind causing the antique panes to rattle loudly in their place. None of them had bothered to notice if there was any differences in the items in the attic.

"Your hair is down." Phoebe immediately pointed out to Piper, who had had her dark glossy locks whipped up in a knot a few seconds ago. Her hair was now cascading down her back, looking a lot fuller than it had a moment earlier.

The eldest witch frowned, curiously reaching around the back of her head and feeling for the mound of hair that was no longer there. She felt around for a few seconds before looking down at her figure and her sisters, "… And we're wearing different clothes…" Piper realized, as the three of them were now dressed comfortably instead of the smart clothes they had worn for dinner.

They were all suddenly shocked out of their thoughts by a child's laugh. Phoebe looked past her sisters and immediately her face turned so pale that both Piper and Paige were frightened by the sudden gaunt expression of their sibling. Her hazel brown eyes bulged out of their eye sockets, adding to the unnerving appearance even more before her jaw finally unclenched and her body began to shake violently. Slowly, she walked past her sisters, letting out a heart wrenching sob as she staggered forward.

Connor sat in the centre of the pentacle that had been drawn expertly by Paige to protect him, smiling innocently as he ran a toy train back and forth on the wooden floorboards and none the wiser of the guilt and love that had just shattered his mother to pieces. He looked up underneath the curtain of jet black hair, shooting a grin at Phoebe before going back to his trains, watching them carefully with beady blue eyes as they darted back and forth, following the path of the train.

Phoebe suddenly let out a pathetic choke of pain as everything went black. She felt as if every fiber of her being had been torn from her and ripped to pieces slowly and painfully. Her rapidly darkening sight suddenly went lopsided as she fell to the floor, the thud of her body on the ground being the last thing she heard before everything was devoured by darkness.

* * *

"Son of a bitch…" Phoebe growled as she paced the perimeter of the pentacle, holding Connor as close as she could without causing him any discomfort, "I don't care if he is a God, I'm going to rip him a new one the next time I see him… Just you wait and see, he's going to rue the day he tried to take my son away from me."

Paige looked up from the Book of Shadows, calmly setting down the pen in her hand, "I take it this means that your memories have come back?" She asked with a cautious tone, perfectly aware of the rage pulsing from her sister at this moment in time, "Honey, you can't feel guilty; we were all made to forget. We know about it now and can do something about it, but you need to keep a cool head, okay?"

Phoebe shot a searing glare at her sister. "Paige, put yourself in my shoes. If one of the twins had been taken from you for a year and you had spent that year in an emotional gutter, would you be so calm, cool and collected?" The witchlighter remained silent, pursing her lips as she picked up her pen again, "Yeah, I thought so."

"Well, we were transported to exactly two hours before Connor was taken, so that means we have…" She looked at the old dusty clock in the attic, peering so she could make out the numbers behind the dirt, "Around one hour. So do you want to just pace and swear, or do you want to help us make use of the future knowledge and time that we have?"

Phoebe halted her pacing movements and turned to her little sister. She kept a neutral expression before letting a small smile through, "You're right. And I'm sorry for flying off the handle at you, it's just-,"

"I know." Paige finished, giving her sister a sincere sympathetic look, "You have every right to be upset. And you were right as well; I would be just as crazy if the same thing happened with my kids… Just try and keep it together, okay? If not for me or Piper, but for my little nephew." She nodded to Connor, "He can tell that you're stressed to the max, you know. Kids are very perceptive to emotions."

The middle Charmed One stared into her son's eyes as he balanced on her hip. She had to make this right; she had to get the year of her life and his life back. Once they saved Connor, they could return to their time with altered memories of what should have been. Happiness, birthday parties, everything would be set right once Connor was saved, "I love you, sweetie." She said lovingly, kissing his cheek and tapping his nose. "So, what can I help you with?" Phoebe asked her younger sister brightly, going to walk towards the Book of Shadows.

"Ah ah ah!" Paige screeched sharply, holding out her hand in a stopping gesture, "You can leave the pentacle, but unless you want to give Thor an easy road to Connor, he needs to stay in it." She warned, lowering her head once she was certain Phoebe wasn't going to take another step with Connor.

Sighing sadly, Phoebe carefully placed her son on the floor, allowing him access to his toys again as she walked over to Paige, who had resigned herself to shaking the pen back and forth in between her two fingers. It was a nervous habit of the youngest Charmed One, to fidget. "Okay, what are struggling with?"

The witchlighter shrugged, "I've basically drained any info I can out of the entry… I'm working on a Power of Three vanquish. It might be the best thing we have; it could slow him down at least."

"Let me see…" Phoebe requested, looking over her sister's shoulder and onto Thor's entry in the book. There was something they were missing. The spell had sent them back to this specific time for a reason, so the solution to save Connor could be found. Phoebe knew that it was something so obvious that they were just skimming over, but what was it? "Magni…" She whispered, looking over the bottom part of the entry before smiling.

"Okay, these…" Piper walked in, holding up three vials of crimson potion, "… Are the strongest hand grenade potions that I could make. I followed your recipe to the letter." She set them down on the table as Paige stood from her stool, allowing Phoebe to take it.

"Did you make the binding field one?"

She shook her head, "We didn't have all the ingredients and I don't think any stores would be open at this time of night. Besides, we're dealing with a God, I doubt even witchcraft at its best would be enough. We've learned that the hard way…" Piper managed to smile, "But maybe we can save Connor and avoid me having to blast holes in my floor like the last time."

"Witchcraft isn't the way to get rid of Thor. At least not ours anyway," Phoebe suddenly announced, picking up the Book of Shadows and holding it out in her arms as she walked towards her sisters, "I have a plan that might work. But Paige, I need to you to whip up something pretty quickly for me."

"Name it." The witchlighter responded immediately.

"I will…" She walked back into the pentacle, kneeling down next to Connor and setting the book down open on the floor. "… Right after I make sure Connor knows who the bad guy is…"

* * *

Phoebe slowly walked around in circles within the intricate chalk outline of the protection pentacle, holding Connor close as she bit her thumb nail anxiously. It wouldn't be long now, if everything was going the same as it had before, the thunder God would be here any minute. She pulled her hand away from her mouth, it was shaking, Anyone who saw her right now would have thought she was about to go into a full blown seizure, but Phoebe knew that any mother in her position would be going through the same thing, possibly even worse.

Then it began, a thick wind blew through the attic, disturbing the pad of paper that they had been using to write spells with and knocking it off the dresser. The pages of the Book of Shadows turned rapidly before the midnight blue cover closed over, as if trying to protect itself from what was coming. There was a rumble of thunder that went through the floor, sending a shiver up Phoebe's spine before she jumped in shock at the pillar of blinding lightning that was now buzzing and crackling loudly just outside the pentacle perimeter.

Thor's hulking figure slowly formed, the golden armour glistening pristinely and the hilt of his massive hammer still sat on the floor. His long blonde hair flew around the small storm that he had created with his arrival and he beamed warmly at Phoebe. "Greetings, once again." He began walking towards the two of them, but as soon as he came anywhere near the pentacle's boundaries, the ancient symbol glowed angrily and the air rippled around him, repelling the divine being and throwing him across the room. He hit one of the dressers, crushing it immediately under his superior weight and reducing it instantly to a pile of wood shavings.

Enraged, Thor's expression changed to a frightening one as he got back to his feet, holding out his hand and summoned his hammer back to his palm, as it had been knocked from his grasp when he was thrown across the room. He swung his weapon back, about to shatter the force field that was preventing him from getting access to his magical son, until Phoebe shot him a triumphant smirk before both she and Connor vanished in a plume of crimson light. The misty redness hovered in the air for a moment, before flying towards a smoking pot on the table and disappearing into the thick smoke. An astral simulation.

The God's nostrils flared as his eyes began to spark with electricity out of sheer fury. They had dared to try and trick him? She was only supposed to look after his son until he could materialize in the mortal realm, and now she was trying to take him away? He wouldn't allow it; they were just humans, with the minuscule addition of being witches. They were no match for him.

Silently, a plume of black clouds enveloped him before Thor disappeared in a violent flash of lightning. He knew where they were, and it would be where they would meet their end.

* * *

The three sisters turned away from the harsh light of the lightning bolt that had just ignited in the middle of Phoebe's living room, burning a hole in the carpet and leaving little flames in its place. Thor appeared, his eyes shining brightly with the voltage that had now devoured his eyes in his rage. His golden armour seemed to have dulled during his fall in the attic, or perhaps it was being affected by the God's fury.

"Give him to me… And I promise I will make it as painless as possible." He sneered, raising his free arm as a coil of electricity danced around it, flowing towards his hand as he prepared to fire the destructive blast at the Charmed Ones.

"I'm giving you _nothing_." Phoebe spat back. Connor's forehead creased in concentration as he sat in his mother's arms. A dome of electrical energy suddenly spread out from his body, covering and protecting his three guardians in the field of electrical power. The two year old looked at the tall figure through the shield of shimmering energy, sticking out his tongue cheekily.

"Go for it, Connor." Paige murmured to her nephew, smiling knowingly at Thor before turning her attention to the toddler in her sister's arms.

Smiling mischievously, Connor narrowed his eyes at the enemy. Thor frowned, before he was suddenly struck in the side of his face by an object of unbelievable weight. He flew across the living room, crashing into the stairwell and bringing the entire structure down on himself in a series of loud crashes. Sharp cracks were heard as the wood came apart, falling on the God. It didn't last for long, as the shafts of wood suddenly flew outwards. Any pieces that would have injured the Charmed Ones were incinerated on contact with the humming electrical shield that Connor had set around them.

Thor stood from the wreckage, his eyes darting around to see what had had the power to hit him with such force. He raised his hand to his cheek, realizing that blood was seeping from the purple injury on his skin. His eyes widened when he saw his hammer hovering the air. He hadn't ordered it to do that. There was only one other being in the entire world that would have the power to control his hammer, and that being was residing in his mother's arms.

The two year old squinted again. The large hammer flew horizontally and collided with Thor's chest, delivering a serious dent to his once perfect armour and hurling him through the wall behind the staircase he had destroyed, throwing him into the dining room, and wrecking the glass table in the middle.

Thor attempted to sit up, his nose bleeding badly and a few bones underneath his armour broken. The three witches stepped through the hole that had been created by his crashing through the structure and stood over him. Connor took control of the Godly weapon again, making it streak towards Thor's head and stop centimeters away from obliterating him completely.

"Leave, never come after me or my son again, or I swear to God…" Phoebe's gaze flickered to Connor as she spoke, "He'll kill you…" She growled menacingly, being backed up by the glares of her siblings who would have happily killed the God.

Thor weighed up his options. He wouldn't be able to get an attack in without being slaughtered by the hammer, which was still hovering over him, ready to crush his skull the second he resisted. Locking eyes with his son by magic, he saw the humanity in him; he would never be the divine being that he was meant to be. Silently, Thor accepted his fate, a quick flash of lightning enveloping him and taking him back to his realm, hammer and all.

Before any of them could say a word, a tornado of white lights engulfed the three witches, taking them out of their past selves and returning them to their time with new memories. The past had been changed, so events had been changed, therefore making the year they had just lived completely different, filling it with memories of happy times as a family, Phoebe living and raising her son. No one would ever remember what had happened before the past had been changed for the better.

Apart from a little two year old psionic, whose premature wisdom had saved her family.

* * *

Katrina walked through the endless inky black sky. Stars shone all around her, glittering like diamonds against black velvet. The Higher Realm was a beautiful place, but this part of it was always breathtaking. This was the path that destiny had walked, a place so special and sacred that only a selected few were allowed entrance. The redhead had been given admission for one reason, and it was because of that reason she was now here.

She reached a certain indistinguishable point within the star spangled area, staring upwards slightly as a smile spread across her lips. _She_ had been regenerating for a year and a half after living a life on the mortal realm for three decades, _she_ would be ready to enter her final destiny and become reborn. There was a gentle humming sound as something formed from the spectacular view, something spherical and when it had fully formed, Katrina's smile widened.

Within the turquoise field of energy, a figure was curled up in the centre. Whoever she was, she was sleeping like a baby, her back rising and falling with breathes. That was the only sign of life as the woman was staying completely still in the fetal position. Her auburn hair had grown in length even more from the last time Katrina had seen her, it now floated up so high that it was almost touching the top of the energy field.

"Awaken." Katrina ordered firmly to the figure in the centre, her face now one of resolute concentration as she kept her eyes trained on the redheaded woman in the sphere. She kept a firm expression even when more signs of life began to show, revealing that he woman was indeed coming out of her eighteen month slumber.

Her nose twitched.

Her fingers flexed.

Her toes curled.

Her eyes flashed open.

She was awake.

* * *

Chapter 2 **"Halloween P3"** Should be up soon! 


	2. Halloween P3

Prince Halliwell – Yeah, well, Phoebe and Connor are similar in some ways, but they are different from Piper and Wyatt. That'll become more evident in the later parts of the story. You'll need to wait and see if it's Keith, and no, Billie isn't coming anywhere near my story.

Phoenix1687 – Thanks, I'm glad it's a success! Thanks for reviewing!

ColePhoebe4eva – Brennan won't hear about it, because the only one who has any memory of what happened is Lorna. Lol. Thanks for reviewing!

Lindsay – Yeah, Emma's not coming back for a while, but she will be in the story! I'm glad you liked it all!

Phoebe turner – Thanks!

Clegs – Don't worry, I don't have any intention of abandoning this story!

Chyp – Thanks.

Fanmania – Lol, yeah, I think this is going to be my best yet!

Ravenix – Oh yeah, Lorna's going to be quite powerful, just like her mother! And you'll need to wait and see how the mystery guy is! Thanks for reviewing!

The-Cheese-Fairy – Holy crap! This review almost makes up for the mean one before it. Lol. Wow, best crossover? I don't think so; CSI crossovers are sometimes pretty good. Haha, I made you like Phoebe! And everyone seems to like Pam as soon as they start reading about her! Maybe it's because I enjoy writing her too, and yeah, Jordann should play a major role on Pam's side of the story. I'm glad you think that I've got every character down, lol. Yeah, I had to think of an innocent way of bringing out the truth through Lorna, and I always have to be careful with sister scenes, as it's hard to keep jumping from each sister's personality. LMAO! I made you love Phoebe! Maybe I might be an okay writer after all.

**Halloween P3**

"Here you go… And tell everyone we're not going to be here for the rest of the day, alright?" Aidan politely asked the trick or treaters, each of them holding pumpkin shaped plastic baskets that the water elemental currently bunging candy into. The two children were dressed in typical Halloween costumes; the boy's face was covered with a vampire mask while a black cape adorned his shoulders. His little sister was dressed completely in black, with a conical hat sitting atop her head. Aidan smirked when he saw that the costume was completed by a fake boil that had been stuck on the little girl's cheek.

"Thank you!" The two of them said in unison, before bringing their baskets back to their sides and walking down the hallway to the next apartment, already forming more childish jokes in their minds to sweet talk whoever answered the door.

Aidan closed the door, leaning over and putting the bowl of candy down on the counter before turning to his two girls, who were sitting on the sofa waiting impatiently for their mother to complete her outfit, which was still to be revealed to be the two girls.

Melinda tugged at the yellow-orange pieces of fabric that were jutting out from the headpiece of her costume. She was sitting in a yellow outfit, with orange flame-like patterns painted on the perimeter of her face while the sides of her mouth had two orange circles painted at the end of them. Little streaks of gold ran from her eyes and went outwards, completing the look of sunlight. At first, she had resisted to being dressed up as the sun, but when she had seen her twin sister's costume, she didn't have many objections.

Emma shot her father an impish grin, her teeth shone against the grey-blue face paint that matched with the crescent moon headpiece. Her costume was much like Melinda's apart from the fact that purple spheres had been painted at the sides of her mouth, and elegant streaks of silver face paint ran out from her eyes. Unlike her sister, Emma was extremely happy with what she was wearing, pulling a little at the grey-purple sleeve before jumping off the sofa and running to Aidan.

"Daddy, you looks silly!" Emma giggled, being swept up easily in Aidan's arms and running her tiny finger over the moustache that had been painted on as part of the elemental's costume.

Aidan was wearing a wearing a simple yet somehow morbid black suit. The only thing that broke it up was the white shirt that sat under the black suit jacket and a black tie running down the centre of it. Thanks to a little magical help from his fiancé, the man's usual blonde hair had been modified into a slick black side part, completing the look of Gomez Addams that he had been looking to achieve.

"Okay, how do I look?"

Paige, for the sake of matching, had gone with the look of Morticia Addams. Aidan was amazed at how well she suited it. Her locks had been extended in preparation for her dress up, allowing her dark hair to flow down to almost her waist. Aidan was completely mesmerized by her dress, as it clung to every curve in her body and showed off her natural seductive figure beautifully, along with the particularly deep dip in the front, showing just enough of her chest for it to be tempting, but not obvious. Black was definitely the witchlighter's colour, as her pale complexion matched perfectly with the darkness of what she was wearing, along with the stop sign red lipstick that made her lips smolder.

"Wow…" He breathed, setting Emma down and moving towards Paige, slinking his arms around her waist and nuzzling her neck, "Are you sure we need to go to the party…?" He said lowly, kissing the area behind her ear all the while ignoring the disgusted noises that the twins were making at their parents' behaviour.

Paige smirked, delicately putting a hand on his chest and pushing him back, "Easy there, cowboy. And try and keep your hands to yourself, this is a kids party we're going to, save the good stuff for P3 tonight…" She whispered back, walking past him and brushing close as she did, driving him wild with desire.

"That's so not fair!" He suddenly exclaimed, turning around and watching her wiggle across to the kitchen and collect something from the refrigerator.

Paige smirked, "But that's part of Morticia's mystique… Always there, but not always _there_. If you know what I mean." She turned to her two children, who had came away from the sofa to stand at the kitchen counter, wanting to get to the party, "Aww… you guys look so cute! You ready to go?"

"Yeah!" Both of them shouted together, punching the air and giving their mother toothy grins.

"Well, okay then!" She turned to Aidan with a glint in eye, changing her smirk to a smile quickly before biting her lip innocently, "Are you going to open the door for your girls?" She asked, raising an eyebrow.

"But of course…" he said in a put on voice, bowing as low as could and making the twins giggle at seeing their father do something like that, let alone with an almost completely different appearance. He opened the door, and immediately Melinda and Emma rushed out, cheering at finally being on their way. Paige grabbed the bag of candy she had taken from the refrigerator and headed out, grabbing Aidan's butt on the way and winking before disappearing down the corridor, her hips shaking from side to side in the trailing dress as she walked.

Taking a deep breath, Aidan sighed and shook his head slowly as he too walked out of the apartment, closing the door behind him and preparing himself for bearing a day of constant seductive passes from his fiancé.

* * *

The low mumblings of demons echoed throughout the candlelit hall of the Underworld. This hall had once been where the most powerful and ruthless creatures of the night would gather to pay homage to the Source, or to show respect for the new leader of evil. However, after the Charmed Ones had inexplicably killed every single leader of the Underworld six years ago, along with the Seer and the Source's spawn, this ground had seemed to be cursed. No one had ever been able to figure out how just three witches had vanquished so many powerful beings so quickly. Demons feared to tread here, secretly thinking that they would meet the same fate of their superiors that day… until now.

"Sylis!" One of the demons ran into the chamber, immediately putting the others on edge with his abrupt entrance as he ran to towards the red haired demon in the centre, "I beg you not to do this, please! He is danger! To you more than us, as you are the leader." The demon argued to his boss, who turned around from staring at the pentagram in the middle of the platform.

Sylis folded his bare arms over the sleeveless black shirt that he was wearing, shaking his head and growling at the underling, "We've been through this, Citre. All Hallow's Eve is the only time we have to do this, and what better way to take control of the Underworld than by taming the demon that even the Source once feared?" He asked rhetorically with a cocky glint in his eye.

"But Annabelle has been-,"

"Annabelle won't be able to do anything once I summon the Slasher! She's just a second rate mercenary compared to him, she'll be lucky to survive if she attempts a confrontation…" He smirked at a silent joke, "Shame too, she is always… fun…" He said with a hint of disdain.

Sylis' gloating was broken by a sudden activity within the pentagram. A warm fiery glow sprouted from its five points, running along the intersecting lines and illuminating the mystical symbol with an otherworldly shine. The light lit up the demon's face as he grinned at the pentagram, revealing unusually sparkly teeth for an evil being. However, his momentary glee was suddenly forgotten when echoing wails of pain and anguish reverberated off the cavern walls, unnerving the various underlings that were preparing for the resurrection spell.

"I told you she would make a move…" Citre murmured quietly, looking up at his superior with a raised eyebrow as if to challenge his decision. More screams from the outer cave were heard. Citre, wisely, attempted to vanish in a haze of shimmers, leaving nothing but the air rippling in his wake. But before he could fully dematerialize, Sylis shot out his hand, a fireball igniting in his hand within a blaze of flames before he hurled it into the demon's chest, reducing him to a pile of ash and a waning scream within seconds.

"Then in that case, I'll be safer with your powers, won't I?" The red haired evil being snarled to the quickly dissipating funnel of smoke as it faded away, taking Citre to the Wasteland.

Suddenly, two energy balls flew through the mouth of the cavern from the adjoining cave. The neon blue spheres spun around each other furiously, buzzing like a swarm of bees before breaking off from one another and landing in the chests of the two guard demons that had been standing in front of the entrance, clearly not prepared for the skill and precision in which the energy balls had been launched with.

A blonde woman strode through into the dark hall, her hair cascading down her shoulders and almost reaching the small of her back, the curls bouncing as she walked. She locked on to the only remaining underling with sharp brown eyes, raising her brass knuckled hand and sending an energy ball sailing from her palm. It collided with her enemy's abdomen, blasting him into the air and reducing him to a large fireball as he was vanquished before hitting the ground.

"Annabelle!" Sylis boomed proudly, holding out his arms in a taunting stance, all the while unaware of the happenings within the pentagram behind him. He walked down the steps of the platform, smirking and narrowing his eyes at the intruder. "If you're looking to stop me, then I'm afraid you're too late this time!"

Annabelle returned the demon's cockiness with a smirk of her own, "Oh, _I_ may too late to stop you… But _he_ is just on time by the looks of things…" She stated, her smooth voice managing to conceal her feelings of triumph at what was about to happen.

Frowning at her, Sylis held the woman's stare for a few moments before he heard a low menacing growl rumble behind him. He turned on his heel slowly, his frown turning into a cringe of terror as he faced the demon that had just materialized from the searing hot pentagram on the platform.

A demon, at least two feet taller than both Sylis and Annabelle, took in the first breath of his new life, his large chest expanding as the muscles in his arms and torso rippled with fresh energy. His face was almost completely covered in black tribal tattoos, a symbol of his power and breed. The demon's eyes flashed open, revealing nothing but an unnerving white underneath. But the most fearful parts of his appearance were the three blade-like weapons which came out the back of his left hand. They shone in the dim light, before the demon, moving at lightning speed, brought them across Sylis' neck and sliced the demon's head clean off. Blood spurted from the bare neck as the head flew into the air, both body parts were consumed in a raging fire before vanishing in a plume of smoke.

Now that Sylis was out of the way, Annabelle was able to get a proper look at the demon that had been summoned. The only thing that bothered her was that she couldn't tell where he had been summoned from, but her rational thoughts faded as she locked eyes with the creature, her mouth falling open for a split second before becoming a twisted scowl. Baring her teeth, the blonde brought her hand down to her side. Her palm glowed a pale yellow before a monstrous weapon conjured itself within the tight fist she had created.

The sickle was thought to be one of the deadliest weapons known to man, but the one that Annabelle was holding onto _was_ the deadliest. The massive blade curved smoothly, made of a light mythril that masked its lethal abilities in the dim light, as the blue-silver metal gleamed softly, giving it an almost peaceful look. The long handle seemed to be made of a dull iron material so that the weapon wouldn't fly out the user's hand for being too light. Detailed carvings gave the dark metal a somewhat morbid look, as it clashed with the shining part of the weapon, which was beautiful, but deadly. Just like its user.

"You… BASTARD!" She suddenly screamed out, eyes almost closing as she narrowed them so far. With great speed and impeccable precision, Annabelle reached around her back, pulling a long ritual athame from the back of her pants and hurling it towards the Slasher.

The weapon flew at the demon's neck at an incredible velocity. He caught it just as quickly with his hand, going to smirk at the woman just in time to see her body blow up into a mass of swirling particles. The molecules swarmed towards him, buzzing loudly as they collided with the Slasher's hard chest, toppling him to the ground just as Annabelle reformed, catching the athame as it flew into air from the demon's grip.

"I shall finally have my revenge…" She snarled at him, raising the sickle above her head and spinning it in a series of breathtaking movements before bringing it down to finish off her enemy. She blinked slightly as the sharp blade clanged off the ground. It was impossible that she had missed. Completely unthinkable.

A searing pain suddenly cut across her back, eliciting a scream of pain and anger as she fell to her knees, not being able to see the three shallow cuts that had ripped apart her shirt and left three matching shallow gashes in her back, all bleeding heavily. Annabelle gritted her teeth with rage when she heard the demon snicker, before sensing him leave the chamber within his shimmers. She had failed. A gasp of pain fell from her mouth before she hit the floor, vulnerable to all the forces of the Underworld.

* * *

Phoebe eyed her sister carefully. The middle Charmed One's eyes flickered before her hand suddenly darted out towards one of the pumpkin cookies that were cooling on a baking tray on the counter. A sharp sting in her hand made her recoil and grimace from the sharp slap that Piper had dealt to her, before pouting and shooting a glare at the eldest Halliwell.

"Ow!" Phoebe winced like a small child, rubbing the back of her palm softly like a hurt kitten, "Mean…" She growled, before turning back to Piper, "You know, if I was Samantha Stevens for real, I could just wiggle my nose and conjure and tray of Halloween cookies!" She argued, looking down at her ensemble briefly and wiping some crumbs off her black cloak from the cookie that she had actually managed to steal.

Phoebe's usual dark brown hair had been swept up under a 'too perfect' blonde wig. The wig flicked out at the end, as if someone had used too much hair spray on the garment itself, but it was good for the look that the Halliwell had been going for of Samantha Stevens. Instead of her usual Halloween costumes that were, most of the time, revealing, Phoebe was donned in a foreboding black cloak, similar to the one that Samantha had worn when doing serious magic. Piper hadn't been able to stop laughing for a few minutes when she saw the blonde wig, but when she learned that her sister had been working on the costume since late August, it made the eldest realize just how empty Phoebe's house must have been.

"Yeah, well, you're not. And trust me, if this thing…" She picked up a thin white stick that was meant to be her wand, "… Really worked, I wouldn't spend most of my evenings doing housework…" Phoebe went to open her mouth, but Piper glowered at her, "Say that I look cute one more time, and that cookie will not be entering your body the way you want it to, got it?"

Most of the Charmed One's person was covered in a baby blue cloak, complete with a pointed hood that stuck out on the rare occasions that Piper decided to raise it. A puffy dress of the same colour was worn under it, and between both sets of thick clothing and from being in front of the oven for most of the party, Piper's cheeks had a healthy glow that she only got by running herself ragged in the kitchen. The most striking part of her costume was the large crimson bow that sat just below her neck, contrasting with her blue cloak and making the red harsher. Apart from her having brown hair instead of withered white; she was the exact double of Cinderella's Fairy Godmother.

"Okay… Let's just put down the sharp pointy object, shall we?" Phoebe grinned kindly, slowly taking the long wand out of Piper grip, as she had been waving it vigorously throughout her threat, "And I think it's great that you're making such an amazing effort, especially since this is the first Halloween that Lorna has the best chance of remembering…" Phoebe shifted away from her sister's eye contact, "… I really don't know if I could raise another person's kid as well as you have…"

Piper suddenly stopped in her feverish race around the kitchen, slowing down her movements. "Well, Lorna's always lived in this house, and… I've been in charge of her well being for so long that it sorta feels as if she's my daughter…" She went into the refrigerator, retrieving the special fruit juice she had made, so looked exactly liked blood, "Besides, she shouldn't be robbed of a nice childhood just because her parents aren't around. I mean, if those were the rules, where would you, I, and Prue have ended up?"

Phoebe smiled, "That's certainly true. Can you imagine if the three of us had been shifted around to tons of different foster homes? We've seen how it's affected Pamela, albeit she's a stronger person for it, but-,"

"It's left damage that'll never heal…" Piper finished sadly, raising her baby blue hood and picking up the tray of pumpkin cookies, "Could you put my wand in my pocket, please? I can't carry both at the same time." She asked Phoebe, who grinned inanely as she stood up.

"I can do one better…" She took the tray from her sister's hands, nodding at the wand on the counter, "We can't have you walking about with your cute little costume incomplete, now can we?" She stuck out her tongue, walking a little quicker as she knew Piper wouldn't start hurling threats in front of the children.

"Zip it." She snapped in response, before grabbing her wand with a sigh and following her younger sibling out into the main area of the ground floor. "I still can't believe we've managed to pull this off. I would have expected demons to be taking advantage of it being Halloween. Maybe they're all just being nice and waiting to attack after the party."

"Or maybe you're just being a worry wart." Phoebe replied, "Look, Piper, go out there and mingle with your friends. You didn't just do this for the kids; you did this so you could reconnect with the real world too." She set the tray down on the dining table, which was already laden with home-made Halloween treats, "Look, I'll hold down the fort here and make sure the kids don't eat too much and get hyper in sugar. Go and enjoy."

"How can I enjoy when I'm dressed up like a giant blue marshmallow?" Piper retorted, looking down at her costume, "It makes me look fat," She sulked, looking to Phoebe for support, who rolled her eyes.

"Honey, you're not fat, nor do you look it. You look cute. Besides, all the other adults are dressed like idiots so you have nothing to worry about. Now go away, you're distracting me from my duties." She said in a put on important manner, standing up straight and pouting her lips.

Piper chuckled at her sister's stance, "Okay… Lorna is allowed a lollipop, Chris is allowed a few cookies, and Wyatt can have a little more than that since he's older, got it? You'll need to check with Paige about the twins though…"

The middle Charmed One snorted out a laugh, "Mel and Emma are always hyper, no matter what they've eaten!"

* * *

Lorna looked around the sun room with a fearful look in her eye as she lapped at the lollipop currently in her hold. She had decided that she didn't like Halloween, mainly because she just didn't get it. Why were all the grown ups dressed in odd clothes? And, more importantly, why was _she_ dressed in odd clothes? The little psionic shifted uncomfortably, the straps of the wings attached to her back irritating her shoulders. The redhead was trying to limit her movements, as every time a grown up noticed her; they would stand over her, raving about how cute her Tinkerbelle costume was.

She, however, did not find it cute. The mint green dress she was wearing was scratching her skin underneath, and the wisps of gold face paint that flew out from her ears were starting to make her face itch. But the worst part was the tiara that Piper had put on her head, every time Lorna moved even slightly, it would topple to the floor and she would be expected to pick it up again. The sooner all these odd people left, the better.

The twins had a completely different opinion to the party however, as every time they walked around with each other. All they would need to do was flash a toothy smile at whatever adult had noticed them and they would get some money just for being cute and polite. The two of them had made a few dollars between them, and had now decided to retire into Lorna's company.

"Look!" Melinda thrust out her palm, showing a completely uninterested Lorna the array of silver and gold coins in her hand. She grinned at the redhead, her teeth shining brightly against the lilac of her face paint, "We coulds probably buy a pony with dis!" She exclaimed excitedly to her sister, whose eyes lit up at the word 'pony'

"Yeah!" Emma replied back with just as much enthusiasm, leaping off the wicker chair with so much vigour that it caused her crescent moon head piece to fall the side slightly, She a took a moment to readjust it a little, frowning with concentration before beaming at her twin, "Let's go gets mo money! You comin' Lorny?"

Lorna pouted as her eyelids drooped, slumping back into the wicker sofa and closing her eyes slowly, "I'm tired…" She announced, huddling into the cushion underneath and nearly drifting to sleep immediately.

Emma shrugged, "Kay! You cans still ride our pony. Nighty night." The two year old said softly, kissing her friend on the forehead before grinning devilishly at Melinda, who returned it with a knowing smile, "Time for Auntie Piper to pay up!" She exclaimed, remembering hearing someone say something like that on a television show, before scampering off with her sister.

Unbeknownst to most of the adults, some of kids had decided to head out into the back garden to watch the fight that was just about to break out between Wyatt and another boy, who was dressed as a knight. The young man lowered the visor of his plastic helmet, drawing a toy sword from the sheath round his waist and holding it in front of Wyatt, who grinned in response as he too draw a sword. This was a play fight after all, any excuse to use swords and pretend they were real warriors.

After much debating with his mother, Wyatt had finally worn her down into making him a costume of his favourite video game character. The young witchlighter was wearing a deep green tunic with a leather belt around his waist. The belt had been Leo's, but Piper had butchered it for the purposes of the costume. Tattered brown boots adorned Wyatt's feet, already muddy from being out in the garden and stepping in all the mushy leaves that had fell from the trees surrounding the garden. Wyatt shifted the emerald green elf hat on his head before reaching around his back and taking the cardboard shield that Piper had painted for him, taking a battle stance. He was extremely proud to be dressed as Link from "The Legend of Zelda"

"You're goin' down!" The little boy, Finny, threatened from within the helmet. He was smiling underneath, as he was looking forward to having a fight with a sword, especially since Wyatt seemed as eager as he did.

"Oh yeah?" Wyatt asked, crouching slightly behind his shield and preparing to fight, "Bring it on!"

The two children charged at each other ready to attack the other, before Finny suddenly halted in his running. Wyatt skidded to a halt, frowning at his opponent before realizing that all the kids surrounding them had also came to a complete stop, each one in suspended motion. The witchlighter looked up, expecting to see his mother standing in the doorway with a disapproving look on her face, but instead he saw Chris run out into the garden, pushing the lens-less glasses of his Harry Potter costume back up his nose.

"Don't worry!" He announced, scratching the painted on lightning bolt scar on his forehead. The paint was beginning to make his head itch, "Mom just had to freeze everybody 'cause Connor was bad." Chris said with a grin on his face, obviously thinking about what his little cousin had just done.

Frowning, Wyatt weaved through all the frozen children and ran back into the house, following Chris into the living room and not even noticing the thick muddy footprints he was leaving on the floor, which he would no doubt pay for after the party.

Chris smirked and pointed to the scene. Phoebe was kneeling down in front of Connor, arguing with him and trying to persuade him to take off his Dr. Von Doom mask. She had already managed to get him to take the hood down, but she was finding it hard to hold a conversation with her son while the metallic mask was covering everything on his face apart from his eyes.

"Honey, why did you shoot lightning at Auntie Piper's vase?" She asked, nodding slightly at the still intact vase on the table, but if Piper hadn't froze everything at the moment she had, the streak of electricity that was currently suspended in mid-air would have wrecked her antique and exposed magic.

"Dey..." Connor began, pointing at a group of frozen children that all seemed to be in the midst of laughing or sticking their tongues, obviously in the midst of teasing, "Didn't belief dat I could shoot lightning like Doc Don Doom, so I shows them!" He said defiantly, shooting a glare at the group.

"Anyone have the slightest idea of how to get rid of this thing?" Piper asked everyone who wasn't frozen, which was all the kids, her sisters, and Aidan. Her face was lit up by the harsh neon glow coming from the bolt as she inspected it. "Maybe I could just blow it up…" She mused, raising her hands before Paige pushed them back down.

"You can't blow up stuff like fire or lighting, you'll just end up blowing up whatever is behind it, which would be Phoebe at this moment in time, and unless she's pissed you off seriously recently, I wouldn't advise it." The whitchlighter recommended, pouting her harsh red lips that shone against her pale skin, "Maybe I could orb it to a place where it wouldn't do any harm…?"

"Or…" Piper began, standing in front of the bolt and taking in a deep breath. Glowing orange cracks ran across her body, spreading out from the centre and massing her out. She quickly raised her hand and made a turning motion, unfreezing the electricity. Immediately, a shrieking sound tore through the house as the lightning collided with Piper's chest. She gritted her teeth, narrowing her eyes to protect them from the brightness of the attack, standing her ground before the bolt had dissipated, being absorbed by her chest and turning into nothing, "I could just do that…." She finished her sentence, smiling and putting her hands on her hips.

"Now, what do you say to Auntie Piper?" Phoebe asked her son, putting a hand on his shoulder and gently turning him around to face the eldest Charmed One. He grabbed the bottom of his mark, pulling it up and letting Piper see his puppy dog eyes.

"Sowy…" He murmured quietly, making eye contact with his aunt and instantly making her forgive him.

Piper knelt down and ruffled his messy hair, which was, oddly enough beginning to be coated with streaks of brown hair the older he got. It was very subtle, but Phoebe had been anxious to point out anything that he got from her, as every in Connor's appearance so far had come from his father, "Its okay, kiddo." She showed him her dress, "See? No damage."

He was about to respond, when a woman's scream of pain was heard from upstairs. The three Charmed Ones each shared a look before heading for the stairs, all of them having to lift up the front of their costumes to make sure that they didn't trip up in the way towards the attic.

* * *

Annabelle gritted her teeth again as Leo went to pull another piece of chipped claw from her exposed back. She held the remains of her shirt tightly over her chest, curling up into a little ball and allowing the Elder better access to her back. The blonde gripped her sickle tightly, her eyes scrunching up as Leo managed to grab hold of the final piece of claw that had come off the demon's hand when attacking her.

"Okay, I'm just going to yank this one out so it'll be over quicker and I can heal you after that." He warned, getting a tight grip on the shard as his brow knitted in concentration.

Annabelle slowly turned her head, glaring at her former whitelighter, "So you just decided to prolong my suffering by pulling at the other ones slowly? You should have just yanked them all," She spat, her eyes wide with fury.

Leo raised an eyebrow, "If I had yanked them all, you would have passed out from the pain." He pointed out, still waiting for her consent to take out the final piece quickly and extremely painfully.

She sighed and shook her head, turning away from him, "Just do it…And you better hope I do pass out, otherwise I'll be kicking your ass for having a conversation while you should have been healing…"

Leo bit his tongue, realizing that, infuriatingly, she was right. He licked his lips before scrunching up his face and pulling hard at the shard. Annabelle screamed even louder than before, thankful to feel the warmth of the healing glow that Leo was now dispersing from his hands.

Piper entered the attic, her eyes widening as she threw down her baby blue hood, "Why the hell are you healing a topless woman on our floor?" She exclaimed, staring at Annabelle as she put her torn apart shirt back on.

The blonde laughed as she stood, fixing her top before smirking at Piper, "Oh please, me and your guy go way back, I'd never be interested in Leo, Sugar. Besides, like I would be interested in a guy wearing that get-up."

Leo looked down at his outfit. Annabelle's subconscious had called out to him during the party, so he had still been in his costume when he had orbed out. The clothes that he was wearing were completely torn apart. Hay had been stuffed underneath the ragged hat on his head, and in the sleeves of his ripped checkered jacket that he wore. The elder shifted uncomfortably in his hay filled jeans. He had never wanted to dress up as the scarecrow from "The Wizard of Oz." But Piper had insisted that he make an effort for this Halloween.

Annabelle quickly glanced at the Elder, "Listen, thanks for the healing. I probably won't need you for another forty years, so goodbye." She said quickly to Leo, before lunging at her sickle on the floor and walking across the room, bursting into a cloud of molecules that flew through the ground and vanished immediately.

"Okay… Who the hell was that?" Paige questioned her brother in law, lifting the front of her long black dress and walking towards the Book of Shadows, thinking that someone with such a distinctive weapon would have an entry within the tome.

Aidan joined her, watching the various information go by as his fiancée flipped the pages of the book, "I could have sworn that I've seen her before…" He mused, putting an arm around Paige's waist as they looked through the book together. The elemental narrowed his eyes at the words on the pages, before shaking his head and deciding just to look at the pictures.

Piper sighed, rubbing her temples forcefully with the heels of her palms before spinning on her heel and heading for the stairs, "Alright then! I'll just go take care of everything! We have guests to thaw, a house to empty, and a party to ruin.".

* * *

Leo frowned as he picked the final piece of straw from his hair, turning his head to the side to inspect for any more hay and straw that might have clung to his scalp when he took off the hat. Piper, now dressed in her normal 'around the house' attire, stood behind him as he looked in the mirror with her hands on her hips.

"So, who was she?" His wife asked with a hint of venom in her voice as she raised an eyebrow and awaited an answer.

The Elder sighed and grinned at her reflection in the mirror, "She was one of my charges before I became an Elder. But she fell off the radar for around a year, so I guess the Elders never thought they would need to re-route her to a new whitelighter, she was still tuned into me when her subconscious called for help." He explained with a casual tone, turning around his wife just as she plucked a piece of straw from the back of his head, nipping him, "Ow! What did you do that for?"

"Oh, I'm sorry." Piper said in the same casual tone that Leo had used when explaining Annabelle before she spun on her heel and stormed out of the bedroom, heading for the attic where everyone else was already waiting and out of their costumes. "We sent the kids away out of the danger. The girls have gone to the Elvin nanny and the boys are with Sheila, I'm sure Darryl's kids kill enjoy the company." She quickly explained, "And don't think a demon attack gets you off the hook, mister."

Paige rolled her eyes as the couple came back into the attic, shifting her glance back to the simmering potion pot in front of her and sprinkling a fine mixture into the concoction, "Are you two _still_ going at it?" She asked impatiently.

"Hey, it's all well and good when you're engaged. No fights whatsoever, unless it's wedding stuff, but since you guys have left all that to me and Phoebe you don't have that to worry about it." Piper shook her finger at Paige, "Just wait until you're married, things will take a drastic turn around. Tell her, Pheebs." Her head whipped around to the middle sister, who was working on a summoning spell for Annabelle.

"I wouldn't know…" She droned bitterly, not even looking up from the pad in front of her, "I see my husband every two months for a week at a time so we don't really waste our time fighting." Her head shot up, eyeing her brother in law, "Have you got anything of Annabelle's that I can scry with? It's just that this summoning spell is tricky when I don't really know what I'm summoning."

Before Leo could answer, Paige hailed her fiancé who seemed to have his face right next to the page he was trying to read in the Book of Shadows, "Honey, are you okay? You seem to be taking having your nose in a book to a whole new level over there." She asked with a caring tone as she looked at him.

Aidan kept his face in the book for a few more moments before realizing the silence, "Hmm…? Oh right, sorry… Yeah, I'm fine, just not really good on book duty, that's all. Besides…" He held up the claw shard that Leo had given him, "A tiny piece of claw isn't really that much to go on."

Phoebe put her pen down, walking towards Aidan and gently pushing him to the side, "I'll give it a go; I know the book a little better anyway so maybe I'll have more luck." She went to take the claw piece from him, and as soon her hand connected with the shard, her temples began to thrum and she was thrown into a premonition.

_A young woman, no older than twenty five, struggled to open her apartment door with two large brown grocery bags. Each bag seemed to be laden with candy, obviously meant for the trick or treaters of her building. Letting out a content sigh as she was glad to be home, she set down her groceries on the kitchen counter before closing the front door, flicking on the light switch and illuminating her apartment. The brunette turned around, immediately jumping slightly with fear at what she saw._

_The demon's head almost brushed the ceiling from his height, his white eyes fixed on the girl, who was frozen in fear as soon as she saw the three blade-like claws extending from the back of his left hand. He merely grinned at her, raising his arm across his chest in preparation her ripping her open. The demon leapt across the sofa, lunging at his victim and making her emit a window smashing scream as everything faded to black._

The witch quickly brought her hand away from the claw, looking towards her sisters who immediately recognized the signs of Phoebe's power. She looked between the two of them, quickly processing what she saw. Wordlessly, she took the claw from Aidan's hand completely this time, walking over to the table she had just left and began scrying with her free hand.

"We have work to do."

* * *

The pitch black apartment was lit up by the sudden arrival of the large cloud of sparkling orbs appearing in the middle of it. The Charmed Ones materialized from the light, their eyes hurting from the sudden change to darkness from the attic to the apartment. All three immediately began to step around cautiously, before their sight adjusted and they began to see dim outlines of the furniture. It wasn't too long before a yelp from Paige and a thump on the ground startled them all.

"It's okay! I just tripped on something!" Her winded voice called out from the floor, before a groan of disgust, "Ugh, yuck, the carpet is soaking!" She exclaimed, pawing carefully at the unseen carpet underneath her and thinking about how her clothes would be ruined.

"Okay…" Phoebe began, going towards the door where she knew the light switch was, "She's not here yet, because in my premonition she-," The witch cut herself off in shock when she flicked the switch, staring at the floor where Paige had tumbled.

The wet part of the carpet that her younger sister had now completely refrained from touching, was actually saturated with the large amount of blood seeping from the corpse in the middle of the room. Three revolting slashes had been made in the woman's chest, the interior of her body on show from how deep the injuries were. The young woman's eyes were still frozen open in sheer terror from the attack, more blood was seeping from her eye sockets, along with a pathetic trickle of the tick crimson liquid secreting from her mouth.

Paige looked behind her seeing that she actually tripped over the poor woman's feet, "Figures… The only time I don't trip over my own feet, is the time I trip over someone else's." She got onto her knees, inspecting the woman to see if there was any chance of her being healed while her sisters just looked away to avoid vomiting from the atrocity in front of them. The witchlighter turned to Phoebe, "If it's any consolation, she died instantly. So she probably didn't feel any pain and we couldn't have done anything if we had gotten here sooner."

Phoebe looked at her with an empty gaze. It was never easy when they lost an innocent, "You know, funnily enough, I don't find that information comforting." She looked around the apartment, taking a step away from the light switch.

"Okay, the demon must be here somewhere. The crystal wouldn't have dropped here if he wasn't." Piper stated, holding onto her forearms and rubbing them. She wasn't particularly cold, she just felt a little safer knowing that all her limbs weren't flailing around all over the place, open to being cut off.

As soon as the words were out the witch's mouth, the bedroom door cracked and shattered as Annabelle was thrown through it from the inside. She fell into the debris, shafts of wood being thrown outwards as she landed. The blonde was barely holding onto her sickle as she tried to sit up, her nose bleeding freely as she stared at her enemy with contempt and rage.

"Bastard…" She growled, throwing out the athame in her free hand and sending it spinning towards the demon, who barely managed to shimmer out in time to avoid the dagger, which lodged itself in the wall of the bedroom as it cut through the being's remaining shimmers. However, he hadn't fully retreated, as he shimmered back in as soon as the threat was over, walking slowly towards his target and raising his hand, ready to finish her off.

"You guys get her, I'll get him." Phoebe ordered, quickly pointing to the gash in Annabelle's back where a piece of sharp wood had pierced her, "Hey!" She yelled, stepping over the downed blonde as a sphere of psionic energy materialized above her eyes before it flew towards the demon, leaving a trail of light pink ripples as it did before crashing into her foe's skull. The demon screamed in pain, dropping to his knees and at the mercy of Phoebe, who continued to fire psionic blast after psionic blast from her mind, keeping him busy.

"Uh… Okay, first things first…" Piper said uncertainly, making a gesture at Annabelle and putting her to a standstill with her freezing power, "Okay, try orbing the wood out of her back, we have less chance of disturbing the freeze that way." She commanded her youngest sister, taking a quick glance at Phoebe to see the demon was still at the mercy of her mental assault.

Paige sighed, shaking her head and looking at the blonde's back. By the looks of things, the woman hadn't even had time to change the tattered shirt that had been ripped apart with her first encounter with this demon, "I'm not sure this will work, but… Wood!" The large piece that had been lodged in Annabelle's back was suddenly enveloped in a swirl of blue-white lights. Paige made a rough gesture to across the room, making the wood fly from its victim in a cloud of orbs and smack off the opposite wall, falling to the floor.

"Phoebe! Time to go!" Piper shouted, keeping an eye on the wound of Annabelle's back as it knitted itself together underneath the brilliant golden glow that was exuding from Paige's palms as she healed her.

Phoebe fired her final psionic blast, turning on her heel and raising her right leg, kicking the demon in the jaw from his kneeling position and throwing him to the floor with a vicious martial art assault. She ran back to her sisters, putting her hand on Annabelle's shoulder as the blonde came to.

The demon leapt to his feet, opening his palm and conjuring a fireball within his hand, the flames crackled in his hand before he turned his arm back, hurling the sphere at the four women. Paige gripped Annabelle's wrist tightly, making sure everyone was connected before quickly orbing out, the fireball hurtling through the remaining lights before blasting apart a sofa in the living room.

* * *

Annabelle glared at Piper and Paige through the buzzing wall of the crystal cage that she had been trapped in. The only reason they had even been able to get her into such a trap, was that she had still been recovering from her stab wound then they set the crystals around her. She turned her gaze to Phoebe, who had just ripped a piece of paper from the pad on the table, walking towards the edge of the cage and folding her arms.

"Who are you?" She asked simply, raising an eyebrow and silently demanding an answer from their prisoner.

The blonde smirked, looking at the piece of paper in Phoebe's hand before staring into her eyes, "Is that going to vanquish me if I don't talk?" She inquired with a cocky tone, not believing that the Charmed Ones of all people would go to such lengths just to get some information that they really didn't need.

"Hmm… Do you really want to find out?" Phoebe replied, showing no signs of it being a bluff.

Giving in, the blonde looked down, "I'm a mercenary. Demons hire me to kill other demons. It's as simple as that." She replied, her face making no movements that Phoebe could identify to see if she was lying.

"The Underworld is full of mercenaries. What makes you so special to warrant getting a whitelighter?" Phoebe asked with the same determination that Annabelle was showing. She didn't want to end up exposing some sort of weakness; she had to stay on the level.

"Special circumstances. Ones that I do not particularly want to share." The blonde spat back, "Besides, you're the psychic here, you tell me what you know about me…" She teased, having already felt Phoebe's powers trying to intrude on her mind when Leo had first brought her into the Manor.

Phoebe's eyes twitched slightly, she folded her arms before addressing the mercenary further, "Why do you keep going after that demon? I mean, he's kicked your ass twice already, and I have a feeling that if I was to move this crystal…" Her foot moved temptingly towards one of the crystal, with one nudge the cage would diffuse, "You would probably go straight after him again." The witch's foot moved back to where it had been, "But of course, that's not going to happen anytime soon…" She went back to asking questions, glaring into Annabelle's eyes, "Surely, all that would be enough to veer off anyone from fighting a demon?"

"All you need to know is I've been after that bastard for ten years. Ever since..." She hesitated, sharing a look with Phoebe before suddenly throwing her hand out at the floor. An energy ball flew out of her palm, colliding with one of the crystals on the ground and knocking it out of the pentagram shape. Immediately, Annabelle lunged for her sickle that had been placed on the table, grabbing it roughly and leaping into the air again before dissolving into a cloud of molecules and vanishing downward.

"Damn!" Phoebe cursed, "What is her problem with that demon?" She yelled to the ceiling before walking over to her sisters, who were both looking at an entry in the Book of Shadows, "Did you guys find the demon?" She inquired, walking around the altar and looking at the same page they were.

"Uh… Yeah, I think. He is the aptly named Slasher demon." Paige explained, "Apparently, they used to be an entire tribe in the Underworld, but after one of them ripped the Source's face apart – I'm guessing that's how his face was screwed up – All of them were killed violently and the Slasher that had attacked the Source was vanquished around a millisecond after inflicting those wounds." She looked up from the book, glancing at the spell in Phoebe's hand, "I take it that's to vanquish the demon?"

"Yeah… Piper, what's wrong?" Phoebe asked, putting her hand on her sister's shoulder as the eldest witch narrowed her eyes in thought.

The eldest sister began to walk away from the book, pacing slightly around it, "It said in the book that the Source's face was disfigured in the battle that brought him to power, which was around five hundred years ago. All the Slasher demons were killed shortly after that… So why would she have a grudge against a demon that's been dead for five hundred years and has only come back into existence because of All Hallow's Eve?"

Paige shrugged, "Well, maybe it killed her ancestor? Or maybe it was never killed and it's just been hiding until now?" She shook her head, biting her lip as she looked down at the Book of Shadows entry, "This is magic we're dealing with, the possibilities are endless."

"Well, whatever's making her go after the demon is something that happened to her ten years ago, she said so before she broke out of the cage." She looked towards Piper, "Why? What are you thinking? That this demon was brought back and vanquished on All Hallow's Eve ten years ago?"

She shook her head in response, "No, I'm thinking that the demon she thinks the Slasher is, isn't really the one she's after." Both Phoebe and Paige gave her blank looks, "Think about it! How many demons have big claws, white eyes, and tribal markings? There're tons! It could be easy to make a mistake between them, especially if you've only seen the demon you're after once and a decade ago."

"So you think that she's going after the Slasher, thinking that it's the demon from ten years ago, when really it isn't?" Paige attempted to sum things up before coming to a realization, "Wait, that means that she knows how to vanquish the demon she's really after, but not the Slasher, so if she tries to vanquish it using-,"

"We get it." Phoebe cut her off before it all got too complicated, "Bottom line: She's gone after the wrong demon and she's going to get a very nasty surprise when she tries to kill it with a very particular vanquishing method. Alright? Okay… We need to find her," The middle witch stated, groaning when she realized that they had nothing to scry for her with."

Piper's eyes widened, "Didn't she leave her athame in the bedroom wall of the apartment? Although with the noise we made, the police are already combing the place…"

Paige stood up, forming a plan as she smiled, "Surely we can get round them with my orbing and your invisibility. Pheebs, you hang back here and make sure the spell's good to go. We'll go and get the athame." She walked towards Piper, linking with her arm and preparing to orb out.

Piper groaned as she was devoured in a swathe of bright lights, "I knew I should have been trick or treating with the kids…"

* * *

Annabelle's sickle hit the ground with an echoing clang as she fell. She whipped her head around, her cheek grazed with a small cut while a large gash in her temple clouded her vision as blood trickled over her eyelid. The Slasher advanced on her, his claw-like hand was in the position of how someone would hold a sword. It was in this moment, even with one of her eyes compromised, that she realized.

"You're not him…" She growled, barely above a whisper as she slowly closed her eyes, seeing the demon raise his claws and readying to kill her violently. She suddenly saw light shift from beneath her eyelids, smirking with amusement as she realized who it was.

"Hey!"

Annabelle opened her eyes just in time to see the Slasher run at the three witches with supernatural speed, throwing the three of them in different directions and causing them to crash into the cave walls. The paper with the spell on it flew out of Phoebe's hand, going up into the air and making a slow descent towards the ground.

Piper looked up to see the demon standing over her, she stared into the soulless white of eyes as he grinned manically, ready to run her through his blades. She was both shocked and repulsed when blood suddenly spurted from the centre of his chest. A curved blade broke through his front, causing even more blood to spill out onto Piper.

"Say your spell and say it fast!" Annabelle urged, barely able to keep her sickle in the demon's chest as he squirmed and writhed in sheer agony of having the sharp object go right through him.

Momentarily stunned, Piper stared at the gaping wound for a few minutes before scrambling over to her two sisters, who had already retrieved the spell from the ground and were kneeling beside each other as they prepared to vanquish their enemy, "The Power of Three shall unite, on this All Hallows Eve's night, to take this demon from our sight, and end it now, this vicious fright!"

The wound that Annabelle had caused began to secret large amounts of smoke. The mercenary removed her weapon from the creature just before a searing flame spread outwards from his chest. It slowly consumed him, eliciting a painful scream as his skin was burnt away gradually. The fire reached the ground before suddenly shooting up and engulfing the Slasher in a tornado that flames that suddenly closed up, causing an explosion and leaving a small pile of ash on the ground.

Wordlessly, Paige walked towards Annabelle, raising her hand to the side of the blonde's face and releasing a soothing golden glow across her wounds from her palm. The blood reversed its flow and slowly made its way back into the cuts, which closed themselves up after being under the light for a certain amount of time.

"Thank you." Annabelle croaked out quietly, avoiding eye contact with the three of them as they made their way over to her, obviously wanting an explanation as to why she had been after the demon.

"Listen, we have a proposition for you." Piper began, exchanging looks with both of her siblings before talking further. "We want you to come work for us." The blonde gave her a cynical look, "If you think that you're up to helping us fight demons, then come on board. We've needed some extra help since two of our family members left, and you seem pretty capable.

"And you expect me to do all this for free?" She sneered, doubtful that the three witches were aware of how expensive her services were.

Piper smirked, "Of course not. For helping us, you get free lodgings. We have an empty bedroom in the basement and we would feed you. Not to mention we have the power and the resources to help you find your demon quicker…" She waited for an answer, before adding something else in, "Oh, and you're allowed to take on other jobs while you're under our employment."

"As long as you tell us about them and accept our help." Phoebe added. "And before you ask, with any job we help you with; we won't take any of the payment. That's just for you; we have jobs of our own."

Annabelle looked at them all, unable to suppress the smile on her face at the proposition that was in front of her. She thrust out her hand, grinning, "Deal."

* * *

Paige slowly closed the door to the twins' room, cringing slightly when it creaked, as she didn't want the two energetic toddlers to wake up and start causing havoc again. Sighing with relief when she had fully closed it over, the witchlighter made her way down the hall, back into the main area of the apartment where Aidan had already retired to the sofa.

"I take it trick or treating with six kids was a handful?" She asked with a smirk, sitting down next to him and slinking under his arm to rest her head on his chest.

Aidan merely groaned in response, "Next year, you and your sisters can do it, because me and Leo have paid our dues in full tonight. Trust me!" He stated. Although he had been run ragged by it, Paige could hear the amusement in his voice, "So, what's the story with this Annabelle woman?"

Paige merely shrugged, "I dunno. I'm actually surprised Piper is letting her stay in the Manor, especially since Phoebe has the most space, but she must have her reasons…" She reached forward towards the coffee table, picking up a pile of leaflets. "Now, since we actually have a night to ourselves for a change, why don't have a look at these holiday packets for the honeymoon?"

Aidan shifted uncomfortably, "Uh… Why don't… We just sit here and relax? I mean, like you said… Um… We finally have a night to ourselves, right?"

Paige shot him a suspicious look, turning slightly so she could look at him directly, "Okay, that does it. Every time I have asked to look at these, you have managed to flog me off with some excuse. You were also weird today at the Manor when we were looking through the book. What's wrong?" She looked down at her hands nervously before looking into his eyes sadly, "Are you wanting to call everything off…?"

"What? No! No, no, no. It's just…" He let out a long sigh, rubbing his head, "You're gonna laugh." Aidan admitted bashfully, taking his hand away from his head and looking at his fiancé with a sheepish expression. "I'll show you, as long as you promise not to laugh…"

Paige, her curiosity touched, narrowed her eyes and moved closer, delivering a soft kiss on his lips, "I promise…" She whispered, moving back to where she had been and clapping her hands, "Now, c'mon! Show me!"

"Okay… But remember, no laughing." He warned as he slowly reached behind the cushion he was sitting next to, exchanging a quick glance with Paige before revealing what he was hiding. "You happy now?" Aidan asked, showing her what he had pulled out from the cushion.

"Aww…." Was Paige's immediate reaction. She took the jet black case from his hand, opening it up to reveal the simple yet quite sophisticated pair of glasses, "Why did you think I would laugh about this?" She smiled, "So that's why you've been avoiding everything that involves reading recently?"

"Yeah, it must be a little left over damage from when the Grimlock stole my sight. And I don't know why I hid them… I guess I was just a little embarrassed." Aidan took the glasses from their case, opening them up and putting them on, grinning, "What do you think?" He asked, frowning when Paige began to lower her head slightly, having a look in her eyes that scared him a little. "Paige?"

"I think…" She began, moving closer to him, "You look so…" She kissed the bottom of his neck softly, "Damn…" She moved up, kissing his cheek, "Hot…" She finished huskily, almost leaping onto his lap and kissing him passionately, pushing him back in the sofa as her weight forced him back. His glasses, now askew from Paige's sensual assault, fell from his face and to the floor, closing up perfectly as they hit the carpet.

* * *

Chapter 3 **"A Handfast Getaway"** will be up soon! 


	3. A Handfast Getaway

Phoebe turner – Thanks!

Chyp – Thanks, and I'll try and remember that for any future references.

ColePhoebe4eva – Lol, yeah I thought it would be a little ironic for him to go as Dr Doom!

Prince Halliwell – Thanks for all the great comments! I'm glad you liked it all, and you never know, this one could be the wedding. Lol.

Clegs – No, I don't have a pic of him yet, I'll work on it for you!

Princess Pinky – Lol, yeah, it'll probably take people a while to start liking Annabelle. And I think you'll be pleased to hear some news about Pamela that I'll be releasing at the end of the chapter…;)

Fanmania – Thanks for al the comments!

The-Cheese-Fairy – Ugh, your reviews are a bitch to reply to. Lol. I'm glad you liked all of it! I thought Aidan having glasses would be a nice touch; it gives him a little bit of a weakness. Lol. I can't really say anything else, apart that all your comments were great and that I'm so glad you think I write Piper well!

Kudos to Laur for the chapter title and amazing help she gave me with Paige's dress. You rock!

**A Handfast Getaway**

Paige tightened the grip she had on her purse strap as she spread her gaze across the luxuriously decorated church hall. She stretched her neck upwards to see delicate white flowers hung up around the wall; the witchlighter couldn't see what kind they were, as they had been pinned up so high on the wall. The ends of the pews seemed to have been decorated with the same flower. Paige could now see that they were white roses, these weren't what she had wanted. Her eyes widened when she eyed the giant arch at the end of the isle, decorated with the same white roses, but the thing that seemed even worse was the large ice sculpture of an angel that stood behind the archway with a wingspan that seemed to barely fit within the building. Again, she it wasn't anywhere near what she had wanted, but she bit her tongue and put on a smile as her sisters made their way towards her.

"Do you like it?" Phoebe asked excitedly as she ran down the isle with Piper by her side, holding her arms up towards the sculpture, "It just arrived about an hour ago. We had to practically wrestle the priest into submission to make him let the thing in a day early. But you know us, we always come through!" She grinned, patting Paige's arm playfully.

"Um… It's… Big, really…. _Really_ big…" The youngest witch stuttered as she looked into the misty eyes of the angel that stood proudly in front of her, "How much did that set you back?" She looked at both of her sisters, who just giggled and waved the away the question.

Piper put her hand on her youngest sister's shoulder, "That doesn't matter. This is your day and we want it to be special for you!" She urged with a large grin on her face, "Did you pick up your dress? We don't exactly want a repeat of Phoebe's first wedding." The eldest gave her younger sister a condescending look, as she didn't trust her to pick up the right dress.

Paige's eyes flashed in anger as she shrugged out of her sister's hold. "Yes." She snapped, walking down the isle a little, taking small steps like she was supposed to do tomorrow, "I'm perfectly capable of picking up my dress. And I thought we established that everything to do with that wedding was sabotaged by evil."

"Whoa… Did the Secret Garden explode in here, or what?" Pamela exclaimed as she slowly walked down the isle towards her three aunts. The witch's neck was craned so far back that, if she was to go anymore, she would end up toppling backwards, "Seriously, overkill much?" She raised her eyebrows at the three of them before giving the roses on the pews an odd look.

"Pam!" Paige suddenly boomed, zipping down the isle and enveloping her eldest niece in a tight hug that cut off some of her air supply, "I have missed you _so_ much!" She said loudly. It wasn't that she hadn't missed Pamela, but she was hoping that her unusual enthusiasm would change the subject of the wedding.

"Pam, where is your bridesmaid's dress?" Piper asked with a shrill tone as she noticed that the witch's arms were completely empty, "Please don't say you forgot it. We ordered it in that bridal shop in Manhattan so it would be easier for you to access, and if you're going to ruin everything by forgetting to-,"

"Leave the crazy at the door, Piper." Pamela snapped, cutting off her aunt, "I dropped my dress off at the Manor, where, by the way, I was greeted by a blonde chick with a whole lot of agro. Anyone mind explaining her presence in the basement?" She looked between the three of them, Piper shifting uncomfortably under the gaze as her sisters turned to stare at her.

"Annabelle's just not a people person. But hey, she's certainly been helping us with some of the more elusive demons. I can't believe some of the connections she has in the Underworld, we just follow her, say a spell and we're done for the day." Piper quickly summed up her new house guest, clapping her hands together and cocking her head, "Besides, it's another female in the house that I can have an adult conversation with. Leave me be."

"Oh, speaking of something old…" She smirked at Piper, who shot her a searing glare in return, "I got your something blue…" Pamela drove her hand into her jean pocket, yanking out an object and holding it in her hand before opening out her palm, revealing a royal blue sapphire that sparkled in the midday light that was filtering through the many church doors. "Emma's favourite kind of gem… I thought that she could at least be here in spirit."

Paige smiled warmly at the sapphire as she took it from her niece's open palm, "Aw… Thank you, honey." She stroked the gem lovingly before putting it into her pocket, "So, how much money did you splurge on a ticket to get here?" The witchlighter ask with a light tone, hoping to keep the conversation going and not give Phoebe and Piper a chance to jump in with wedding details.

Pamela sneered and shrugged, "Not as much as you think. Student discounts are a wonderful thing, although I'm missing a few lectures tomorrow, and I've got a mid-term to study for… But I've brought some of my books with me so I thought I could spend some time studying. Although that'll be after I recover from the massive hangover I'm gonna have! We are celebrating your final night as a single girl, right?" She grinned inanely, nudging Paige suggestively.

"Oh, actually, we did that last night. Nothing fancy, just a nice dinner with us and a few people from work. Thank God no demons attacked or it would have been ruined." Piper shared a look with Phoebe, who agreed heartily, nodding her head vigorously, "But we really did have a nice evening, right?"

"Yeah… right…" Paige said meekly with a tone that managed to mask her true feelings from her sisters, until Pamela let out a snort of laughter.

"What? Are you kidding me? I remember you telling me what you had planned, and it sounded so wild, that- Ow! Did you just pinch me?" She twenty year old looked at her youngest aunt in disbelieve, rubbing her elbow as she bore holes into the back of Paige's head, who was now grinning at her two siblings before looking at her watch.

"Wow, it's almost ten, didn't you guys say that you only had to get in early to take care of stuff today?" She asked, "I wouldn't want to you to be late and have to make up that lost time tomorrow!" Paige gave them a nervous laugh before subtly putting her hand over the pocket which held the sapphire.

Phoebe brought up her sleeve, looking down at her watch and gaping, "Oh God, I'm gonna be late, I have to go." She grabbed her purse from one of the nearby pews, putting a loving hand on Paige's arm as she passed by, "Tomorrow is going to be _so_ special! I promise." The middle Halliwell let out a small squeal of excitement before walking down the isle towards the entrance of the church, pushing on the metal bar and causing the large oak door to fly open.

"We'll talk final food stuff for tomorrow later tonight, okay?" Piper asked, lunging for the leather jacket that used to belong to Prue where it was resting on the pew. "Alright." She looked over Paige's shoulder, "Pam, I swear to God, if you're lying to me about that dress-,"

"It's on the sofa in the living room!" Pamela snapped, throwing her hands up, "If you want to waste more by going home and checking, then that's up to you. You've only got a club to run and five other people in your house to feed."

Eying her suspiciously, Piper grabbed her purse and breezed down the isle in the same fashion Phoebe had, shoving on the metal bar a little more forcefully and throwing the door wide open, allowing the chilly November sun to stream into the church for a brief moment, before closing over again. Pamela spun back around to her aunt, frowning in confusion.

"Okay, what is with smiley and agreeing Paige that I have just witnessed in the last few minutes?" She picked at a flower on the pew, "I mean, white roses? I know for a fact that this is not what you wanted."

Instead of replying at all, Paige just raised her hands to her face and slowly burst into tears, her shoulders shaking violently as tears streamed down her face. Sobs wracked her body until she brought her face up, revealing that her mascara had practically run completely off her face, "Everything's all gone wrong…" She whispered, before retreating back into her hands and continuing to weep.

Pamela let out a loud sigh, moving towards her aunt and rubbing her back, "Well, this isn't exactly the party I had in mind…"

* * *

Emma kept her gaze locked on the butterfly that had landed on the tip of her raised index finger. Her sapphire blue eyes never flickered once as the delicate creature flapped its sparkling emerald wings slowly in the sun. She smiled a little before blowing the lightest amount of air from her lips, causing the butterfly to flee the scene at the slightest sign of disturbance and dance into the distance. "Bye bye…" Emma whispered with a content smile on her face, wiggling her fingers in a small wave at the butterfly that was slowly disappearing from view.

The redhead lent back, resting her head on the tree trunk that she had decided to sit at. This truly was the most peaceful place that Emma had ever known. A lush meadow of pale yellow sunflowers spread out endlessly before her, swaying pleasantly in the gentle breeze that shifted the branches and leaves of the tree that she was sitting under, casting rippling shadows across the psionic's face and the perfect grass around her. It was absolute heaven.

"Keeping calm, I hope."

Emma turned her head and sneered at who she saw; her heaven had just been brought to a standstill by Katrina's sudden appearance. Although the auburn haired woman seemed at peace in this place, Emma was still aware of the mayhem that Katrina had wrought during her time on Earth. She knelt down next to Emma, who narrowed her eyes as she stared out into the meadow; the calm was now completely ruined.

"Yes, although you're doing a great job of wrecking that…" She spat, staring at Katrina, her eyes now shifted from a tranquil blue to a harsh grey. "What do you want? I thought you were leaving me alone for the time being. Those were your words, after all."

Katrina sighed and shook her head, brushing her palm across the short grass that they sat on and making it blossom into a small bed of daisies, "You need to start trusting me, Emma. I mean, you can't spend eternity ignoring the only person who's actually willing to help you adjust."

"I don't need your help." Emma stated defiantly, going back to watching the sunflowers sway slightly in the heavenly breeze, "I have never needed anyone's help, not even during my life on Earth."

"Did you ever stop to think that it was that attitude that got you killed? Twice?" Katrina retorted with the same amount of venom that Emma had used while addressing her, "You didn't even work well in a group when you were in Mutant X, especially during the end of that chapter of your life…"

Emma's eye twitched in annoyance as she refused to give the Seer the dignity of eye contact, "No, actually, what got me killed was you conveniently taking away my powers just before your master attacked the Manor." She turned her head slightly and gave Katrina one of the soul singeing stares that she had perfected during her life, "Or did you just forget about that little piece of darkness in your past. Not to mention you fried the Book of Shadows… If the Charmed Ones had known that you had orchestrated my death and Grant's, they wouldn't have taken your little gift so quickly."

"Little gift?" She raised one eyebrow was her mouth twisted into a scowl, "I restored their powers, and thanks to the vision of the future they I gave them – which, by the way, I got into some serious hot water for – they were able to realize that their dreams could only be achieved if they fully completely embraced their destinies. Another thing I helped them with. And the book was given to them so they didn't feel so helpless…" After she had said this, she broke out into a smile, "I'm impressed, your mind's eye must be really strong if you were able to keep up with events that happened while you were in your regeneration sphere-,"

"Don't you mean prison?" The redhead cut her off sharply, "I would have happily moved on into the afterlife, but instead you shoved me into a pea pod for a year and a half so I could watch my daughter go through her most vital years without her real mother!"

Katrina gritted her teeth, even in the calmest of places, she was unable to keep her patience when she was pushed too far, "Fine, once you're ready to accept the fact that your life is not yet over, come and find me, because the sooner we begin your training, the sooner you'll be able to return to precious daughter," She spat, getting up from the ground and storming off, leaving heavy footprints in the grass with her harsh steps before vanishing with a ray of sunlight that took her form away from the meadow.

Emma let out an aggravated groan, fisting her hands around the grass and the daisies that Katrina had made grow, ripping them from the ground and tossing them out in front of her in a rage, temporarily clouding her vision in a shower of white and green shreds in the air.

It was official. Her inner calm had been screwed.

* * *

"Okay…" Pamela sat down with the tray, picking up one of the cups of coffee and one of the muffins before putting them on Paige's side of the table, "Why don't we just start from the beginning?" She took her own coffee and drank in one large sip, letting out a content sigh, "I'll demolish my coffee while you talk. I'm still on New York time, so technically I've gone past noon without my morning dose of caffeine. It must be a Halliwell record, huh?" The witch gave her aunt a sympathetic look, "What is it? Bad muffin?"

Paige swallowed as she wiped her eyes, pushing the plate away from herself delicately and clearing her throat, "I won't fit into my dress…" She said sorrowfully, staring at the muffin with a hunger that only a woman who hadn't had chocolate in months could get. "Piper and Phoebe will-,"

"-Never find out." Pamela finished for her abruptly, narrowing her eyes and smirking behind her coffee cup, "Well, okay then. I paid for it, and if you're not going to eat this delicious, delectable, spongy, melt-in-your-mouth double chocolate muffin… I'll have it!" She grinned, reaching for the muffin.

However, it evaded her grasp as Paige suddenly grabbed the edge of the plate, yanking the snack back to her, "No, it's okay… One little muffin won't hurt, right?" She didn't even wait for an answer, immediately tearing off the paper casing around the bottom of the muffin and plowing it into her mouth. "OhmiGod… That's _so_ good!" Was the muffled reply from Paige's chocolate sponge filled mouth, "You just totally manipulated me there, didn't you?" She said, completely annoyed at her own stupidity and humiliated at the fact that she had wolfed into the snack in such a manner.

"What can I say?" Pamela asked rhetorically, raising her mug to her lips again and taking a sip, "I'm good." She grimaced slightly at the liquid in her mug, licking her lips, "Wow, this just doesn't have the kick it used to. And okay, how about we stop with the sugar?" Pamela advised as she wrenched the sixth sugar packet from Paige's hands, "We don't want your teeth to fall out as soon as the coffee hits them, do we?" She lent back into her seat, crossing her legs over and taking another sip, "So what the hell have the Matrimony Maniacs done to you in my absence?"

Paige let out a sigh as she brought her coffee cup away from her face, licking over her top lip and removing the layer of froth that her cappuccino had left, "I can't really remember when everything started to go haywire…" She dug into the muffin again, taking a smaller and more dignified bite, "One afternoon, Piper suggested something to me about flowers. It seemed like such a small thing and I didn't want to hurt her feelings, so I let her have it. It's been like that ever since, I've just been rationalizing it every time its happened, telling myself that the things I'm letting them control are just small unimportant things… And now, one day before my wedding, I realize that my sisters have completely taken over."

"Well…" Pamela lent back forward, setting down her coffee mug, which was now completely drained of any fluid, "Although it's mostly Piper and Phoebe's fault for taking advantage of your being kind, you should have told them the second you didn't like something that they doing. I know that they're crazy now and again, but they want tomorrow to be the happiest day of your life."

"I know…" Paige said with a weary tone, "I know… But there's always been some sort of wedge between us. We're really close but Piper and Phoebe just have this bond that you can only get with growing up with someone. I had to catch up when they discovered me, and I'm just starting to build that bond with them, so I didn't want to do anything to jeopardize it…"

"But at the expense of your own wedding? C'mon, Paige… What does Aidan think of what's been happening? Surely he's noticed something's not right. I mean, you can't have managed to hide your feelings very well if even I could notice something's wrong."

Paige groaned and gave her eyes an angry roll, "For Aidan, tomorrow is as simple as jumping to a tux and showing up. He has no idea of what's actually going on!" She took another bite from her muffin and a sip of coffee from the mug in front of her before her eyes drooped sadly and she let out a mournful sigh, "What am I going to do…?"

Pamela bit her lip slightly, silently going over the plan that she had just formulated in her head before saying anything. She let out a sigh and reached into her purse on the floor, taking out a stack of post-its and pen, "Tell me what you want, and I'll have it done for you by tomorrow."

"Are you serious?"

"Deadly." The twenty year old replied, pushing her empty cup away from her and making space for her wad of yellow slices of paper, "Well? C'mon, shoot! Just tell me what you want, and I will get it sorted. No more, no less." She narrowed her eyes at the hesitation that was evident on Paige's face, "I am giving you a chance to rip the reins of your wedding away from your sisters, just tell me!"

Paige quickly brushed her hands across her cheeks, wiping them of any moisture that may have been left from her crying in the church. She ran a hand through her hair, giving Pamela a weary glance before sighing, "Small, elegant, and intimate. I've never been into the while Cinderella wedding thing… Are you sure you can pull this off?"

"Small… Elegant… And… Intimate…" Pamela repeated, scribbling down her aunt's words and smiling once she was done, "Okay, I think I can manage that! Your wedding is going to be…" She smirked as ideas began flowing into her head, "Heavenly…"

* * *

"Here…" Aidan said as he drove the pen into the paper, scribbling over a part of what he had just written and almost throwing it at Piper, who shot a glare at him from behind the empty bar before quickly scanning what he had shoved in her face. "Does that one meet your standards?" He asked with a monotonous tone, tapping the pen off the side of the counter and doing one full spin on the bar stool before turning his attention back to Piper.

The eldest Halliwell shook her head, rolling the piece of paper into a crinkled ball and throwing it into the trash can behind the counter, "That one is no use either." She shrugged innocently when Aidan let out a mournful groan and let his forehead hit off the bar, causing his glasses to fall down from his nose slightly, "C'mon, Aidan. What I'm asking you to do isn't that hard. Just sum up why you love Paige within fifty to ninety words. The only reason you would have trouble with it was if you didn't love her…"

"Or maybe I love so much that I can't express it in words." Aidan said back, putting the pen down and staring at Piper through a curtain of thick blonde hair, "Why do I even have to get my vows checked over by you anyway? You're not the one who's going to be saying them tomorrow in front of… how many people are coming again?" He asked, pushing his glasses back up and tapping the pad with his pen.

"Uh… I'm not sure about the exact number, but it's around one hundred and fifty… I think. There might be more, you know, some late RSVP-ers." She smiled at him, not understanding why all the colour from his face had completely drained at the mention of the number.

Aidan whipped his glasses off, narrowing his eyes, "You're kidding! We don't even know that many people! How do you expect me to stand up in front of all those people – people we probably don't even know – and say all this?" He sneered at the paper with disdain, "And Paige, she's even worse with saying her feelings out loud than I am!"

"Oh, believe me, mister. I know it! You seem to have forgotten that I had a front seat for the saga that is you two. Even after you came back, it almost took you a year to realize that you were meant to be…" She finished with a warm smile, "But all that is what's going to make tomorrow even more rewarding." They stayed in a serene silence for a few moments, before Piper turned her head towards the ceiling, "Leo…" She called softly, hoping to summon her husband to the club.

Sure enough, both Piper and Aidan's faces were lit up harshly by the column of bright lights that descended from the ceiling, the orbs swaddling around each other before leaving the elder and Lorna, who stood next to him holding his hand, in their wake, "Can whatever this is wait?" Leo opened with an inpatient tone, "I was about to take Lorna to the park." He looked down at the little girl before giving his wife a pleading look.

"Well… No, this can't wait. Aidan needs help writing his vows. I thought you would be the perfect guy for the job, seeing as how I can't really give a man's perspective on the whole thing. So how about…" She reached down and scooped Lorna up into her arms, resting the toddler on her lip, "… You two work on this stuff, and I will take little madam here to the park." Piper grinned as she rubbed noses with her 'surrogate' daughter, making Lorna giggle with content.

"Kay, Mommy!" The redhead giggled, clapping her hands together excitedly, completely unaware of the tension that she had caused just by saying the M word. Lorna had always known her two guardians as Piper and Leo, but occasionally the odd 'Mommy' or 'Daddy' would slip out. She would of course completely forget about it after saying it, but it always chipped a little of Piper and Leo's hearts away when they were reminded that Lorna really wasn't their daughter, "We go on da swingies?"

"Um… Yeah, we can go on the swings…" Piper said, the enthusiasm now lost from her voice underneath a tone of disappointment and sadness, "I'll see you later, honey." She leaned up, giving Leo a loving kiss on the lips before pulling up the detachable part of the counter and heading towards the steps that led to P3's entrance, "And Aidan, I want to see those vows before five, mister!"

Instead of even replying, Aidan grabbed the notepad that was sat in front of him and hurled it in Piper's direction. The witch vanished from the stairs just in time to avoid the flying wad of paper, which smacked off the back wall and tumbled pathetically down a few stairs before coming to a stop. The elemental shook his head before turning to Leo, who was suppressing a smirk.

"It's only because we've been friends for years that I'm comfortable with saying this, Leo. But your wife is a raving lunatic at times." Aidan stated calmly, making his future brother in law laugh knowingly as he got both of them a bottle of water from behind the bar, throwing one towards Aidan who caught it with ease.

Leo twisted the cap off the bottle and took a quick sip, "Yeah, Piper's been pretty full on with this wedding. Phoebe too. In fact, the only person who hasn't seemed enthusiastic about the wedding at all is-,"

"Paige, right?" Aidan finished the elder's sentence for him with a glum tone, taking a swig from his water bottle and putting the cap back on, "Yeah, she's been a little distant this past week, but I think it's just cold feet." He sighed as he turned around, looking at the downed notebook on the stairs, "Now what am I going to do about these vows? Or a more fitting question is how am I going to get them past Piper?"

Leo shrugged, "Just do everything she tells you…" He said, causing Aidan to give him a look of disbelieve before a cheeky grin spread across his face as he finished his sentence, "… And change everything to how you want it once you've got it past her! It works every time." He assured him with a smile, over looking upwards with a groan, "Looks like I wouldn't have been able to take Lorna to the park after all…" He said in a sad tone, "Are you gonna be okay to do this?"

"Yeah, go be bored." Aidan smirked, "And thanks." He smiled, holding out his hand and shaking Leo's firmly before the elder began to vanish in clouds of bright orbs that consumed him before heading up towards the ceiling, leaving Aidan to retrieve the notebook from the stairs and begin writing once more.

* * *

Pamela lit the final candle in the circle, setting the lighter down on the small table in the foyer and taking a few steps back so she was a decent distance away from the five flaming wicks on the floor, "Hear these words, hear my cry, spirit from the other side, come to me, I summon thee, cross the Great Divide…" She chanted firmly, smiling as magic began to fill the air.

Glowing angelic spheres conjured themselves in the centre of the rug, swirling furiously around each other in a tornado of bright lights that made Pamela squint her eyes to stop them from hurting. A flash ran down the column of lights, leaving no globes in its wake and revealing an extremely confused and surprised Penny Halliwell, who raised an eyebrow at her great granddaughter upon her conjuring.

The deceased witch scanned the foyer with curious eyes before resting her gaze on Pamela, "Well, are you just going to gawk at me all day or are you going to tell me why exactly I've been summoned?" She snapped, holding out her arms in a questioning stance before taking a step out of the candle circle and becoming corporeal within a golden glow.

"Can't I just summon my Great Grams…" Pamela smirked at Penny's noticeable flinch, knowing that she hated to be reminded or her age by titles that started with 'great', "…Whenever the mood strikes?" The twenty year old asked innocently.

Penny raised her eyebrow again, "I know that glint in your eye…" She warned, her eyes narrowing at Pamela's expression, "It's something that the oldest of each generation have, something that they get after being in charge for a certain amount of time. Your mother had, her mother had it, and I have it, naturally of course…"

"How about you just say hello and give me a hug?" Pamela suggested, smiling when a grin broke across Penny's face and the two got each other in a loose embrace, patting each other's back tenderly before pulling away, "Although… You're right; I didn't just call you because I felt like it." She watched her great grandmother scowl, "But it's for a good reason, see, I need to get a Handfasting done…"

The old witch's eyes lit up at the mention of the ceremony, "Oh! A Handfasting? Why didn't you say so?" She grinned with pride, knowing that it could only be one person who she was meant to be joining in marriage, "So Paige finally worked things out with that elemental guy? Good! Not that her kids even need a father… But nonetheless, it will be my honour to join them in matrimony!"

Pamela cringed slightly, lowering her head as she did, "Um…Actually-," She cut off by the booming sound of snapping wood and smashing china from the top floor of the house. The witch groaned as she headed for the stairs, "I knew I would be doing this the moment I came back!" She exclaimed to Penny as she followed her, "A visit home just wouldn't be the same without it…"………

Annabelle threw out her hand again, a screaming neon blue energy ball flying from her palm and colliding with the demon's chest, the resulting explosion hurling him across the room and causing him to crash into the remains of the dresser that the blonde had destroyed with an off target energy ball a few seconds ago. Annabelle advanced on him, brining out a potion from her pocket as she did.

"What the hell are you doing? I thought we had a deal! I give you work and you keep me off-limits!" The demon protested, putting his hands up in front of himself to act as a pathetic barrier between him and his inevitable vanquish.

The mercenary shook her head, raising her arm so she would be ready to throw the amber liquid filled vial at her enemy, "I don't need demons to help me anymore." She scowled, "Resources are a hard thing to come by, especially ones as powerful as the Book of Shadows. And with the Charmed Ones on my side, any demon I cross won't dare come near me." Annabelle didn't even give him a chance to reply, as she thrust the potion towards his feet. The vial smashed with a small clink as the potion began to take effect. Smoke poured from every orifice on the evil being's body before a plume of fierce flames ignited underneath him and began to burn him to death. He let out a pathetic scream before exploding in a shower of dazzling green sparks, making Annabelle smirk at the rather pleasant looking after vanquish as the emerald embers fell to the floor.

Pamela practically flew into the attic with her hands outstretched, prepared to use one of her various powers to vanquish a would-be attacker. She couldn't help but feel a little disappointed. As demons hardly came after her now that she had branched out on her own, her powers were feeling extremely underused, "What the hell happened in here?"

"I summoned him, too bad he wasn't prepared for his death." Annabelle said in a gleeful yet menacing tone as she crossed the floor back to the book, which stood on the altar that was being bathed in the early sunset light pouring through the attic window, "I'm sorry about the mess, but Piper said it happened all the time and as long as I'm vanquishing demons-,"

"Now here's a girl who isn't afraid to utilize her powers!" Penny exclaimed from the doorway, looking at the severe scorch mark left by the demon's vanquish, "Powerful potion, judging by the smaller scorches left by sparks. You must really know what you're doing." She hit Pamela on the arm, "You and your aunts could learn a thing or two from her…"

Annabelle smiled, cocking her head slightly, "Hmm… Someone around here who actually knows their potions. And thank you, I like to think I've got a certain talent for the craft." This comment earned a snort of laughter from Pamela, "Something funny?" The blonde snapped, not possessing the patience to be dealing with the witch at this moment in time.

"You're not even a witch! So how can you summon demons and make vanquishing potions?" Pamela said skeptically glaring at the new houseguest of Halliwell Manor and not liking her one bit, "And what's with the name 'Annabelle'? Do you have a surname or is it like Cher and Madonna?"

"What do you think?" Annabelle spat back, holding the young adult's gaze, knowing that whoever looked away first would lose this little grudge that they had started.

"It makes me think you're hiding something." Pamela replied simply, never once breaking her stare, not even to blink.

"Oh, for the love of God…" Penny groaned, making an 'X' motion with her arms in between the two woman, "Pam, sweetheart, please leave your territorial issues at the door. We don't have time for it, especially since I want to take some time looking at this so called new and improved book…" She snorted in disgust, sneering at the part of the midnight blue cover that she could see while the tome was open, "Shift." The deceased witch ordered impatiently as she gently willed Annabelle to move to the side. "We've got a wedding to plan!"

Pamela bit her lip in hesitation, her expression now softened so she could break the bad news a little more easily, "Um… Actually… Great Grams? The whole reason Paige asked me to do this is because she doesn't want to follow in her sisters' footsteps, and since you married Piper and Leo… maybe you could have another High Priestess perform it?"

"What…?" Penny breathed, halfway between disappointment and fury as she stopped flipping through the pages of the Book of Shadows to walk around the altar and face her great granddaughter.

The witch held up her hands, cringing at what was about to be unleashed, "But of course, this High Priestess would be nothing compared to you, it's just that Paige is wanting her wedding to be her own, so…"

Penny gritted her teeth, before a glint in her eyes appeared and she smirked, "Actually, I think I may have someone in mind. She's been training in the art for a while now, my protégé if you will… And she's very good at what she does."

"Great! Who is it?" Pamela enthused, grinning and not taking in the mischievous expression on the old witch's face as she thought of the High Priestess that she had in mind.

Penny merely smirked in response, "You're not gonna like it…"

* * *

Paige smiled wistfully at the beautiful white wedding dress that she was seeing on herself in the reflection. Like everything she had wanted her wedding to be, Paige's dress was simple and elegant. Soft long sleeves ran down to her wrists, before blossoming outwards and covering her hands. The bodess only came up to the underside of the sleeves, leaving the top part of Paige's torso exposed and showing just enough skin to be a vision of beauty. The lower part of the dress splayed out, completely covering her legs in the shape of a bell, making the sides of the dress disappear from the reflection as the mirror wasn't large enough.

The witchlighter cast her gaze towards the window of Piper's bedroom. She and all the other females of the family had stayed at the Manor the night before to make sure that Paige and Aidan weren't cursed by the old tradition of seeing each other before the wedding. The sun was setting outside, and it was only three thirty in the afternoon. Paige had wanted to make her wedding late in the day, as she knew from experience that no one liked getting up early and she didn't want to curse that onto her guests.

She sighed with a mournful look on her face, letting her hand travel down her abdomen and brushing out any of the creases that where being caused by her wearing her dress. Paige truly felt that this dress was the only she had had control of. Holding to the golden heart shaped locket that Pamela gave her to be her something borrowed, she went over to Piper's nightstand and opened a velvet box, revealing a silver charm bracelet that had the Atlantian emblem and the triquetra interlocked with one another, to be a symbol of her and Aidan's union. Phoebe had bought her to be her something new. She took it out the box and put it around her wrist, linking it around the back and making sure it was secure before turning back around to the mirror. Her hair had been swept up into a knot, allowing two wavy strands of hair to fall down around her face and frame her features perfectly. She hated wearing her hair like this, but it had been how Piper had styled it before leaving, and she didn't want to risk looking like an idiot at her wedding.

Her wedding. She kept saying those words over and over again, hoping that they would calm her nerves and remind her that she was going to spending the rest of her life with the one man who made her happier than anyone in the entire universe ever could. But a small black hole of doubt tugged at her heart. They had been through so much to get here, but Aidan had never denounced his crown, he was still the king of Atlantis. What if they wanted him back for good? Or what if he just decided that he preferred living in royalty rather than living with her? She couldn't take to get her heart broken into a million pieces ever again, especially since she would have two extremely energetic toddlers to make care of if he ever abandoned her…

Was she doing the right thing?

Paige suddenly inhaled a sharp breath, immediately throwing her hand to her chest as it rose heavily with her laboured breaths. At first she thought that her dress was on too tight, but it had been perfectly comfortable up until now, so why the sudden change? She looked up into the mirror, her features even paler than usual. She couldn't go through with it, and before she could even try and talk her herself out of it, she was enveloped in a swirl of blue and white lights, slowly dragging her form away from the house she orbed out.

* * *

Piper let out a wail as she ducked back around the stone column, just barely dodging the sphere of blazing flames that brushed past her arm, singeing her skin before crashing into the wall, reducing a large chunk of the stone to dust and leaving a large jagged dent in its wake. She winced as she patted the smoking fabric of her blouse, glaring at Phoebe who was standing next to her behind the pillar.

"See? I knew it was better that we didn't change into our dresses before coming here. How would I explain a giant hole in the sleeve?" She raised an eyebrow at her younger sister, who merely shrugged in response.

"I dunno. Left the iron on it for too long?" She offered, ducking out briefly from behind the pillar to inspect the situation. Narrowing her eyes as she turned her away from the action, she summoned a humming white globe of psionic energy above her eyes before whipping her head back around and releasing the blast at the two demons that were a good fifteen feet away from her. The psionic blast collided with one of the henchmen, throwing him into his partner and giving Piper the opportunity to leap out and deploy her hands, reducing the two of them to a quivering explosion with just a quick gesture. "This is endless! We shouldn't have taken on a hive of Swarm Demons without the Power of Three!"

"Annabelle said she had a potion to take out the Swarm King. Apparently he's a little weaker when the one we faced. Besides, I would rather take care of these bastards now, rather than have them attack at the wedding." Piper protested, "Although I really don't know what's taking her so long to find the king. Her demon tracking skills are amazing." Piper looked around the corner, her jaw dropping, "Okay, there's about ten of them! You reflect, I'll crack the ground. Okay? Okay!" Without even waiting for Phoebe's answer, Piper dragged her little sister out into the firing line.

Immediately, five fireballs were thrown from the first row of masked demons, all of them wearing the same smug look on their faces as they thought that the two witches wouldn't be able to survive their onslaught. Wordlessly, Phoebe tapped into her enemies' minds, using her telempathy and altering the fireballs' original target. The fireballs came to a halt in mid air before flying back at their throwers, hitting them in the chest and causing them to meet their vanquish in a brutal sea of flames that engulfed all five them. Before the five that made up the second row could retaliate for their fallen comrades, Piper made a vicious cutting gesture in the gesture in the air, causing a blinding light to be released from the large fissure in the ground that opened with a cracking noise, freeing a cloud of steam before the five evil beings fell into the hole. Their fates would be sealed the moment they reached the earth's core.

Annabelle chuckled quietly from her hiding place in the shadows. She knew that the Swarm Demons would be no match for even just two of the Charmed Ones. It was the perfect distraction for the Wiccan duo, as the determination to win that they had developed over the years overrode any desire to get back for the wedding. She just hoped that with this act of kindness towards Paige, Pamela would begin to trust her.

They would all need to trust her. If they hoped to survive what was coming.

* * *

Paige pushed down the bottom part of her dress that was impairing her vision, allowing her to watch the hundreds of small light globes that were car headlamps, heading into the city, probably to their homes. She let out a small sniff, wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her dress before shivering. It was always a little chilly upon the top of the Golden Gate Bridge, but in the middle of November, it was even worse. The thin delicate fabric of her outfit wasn't doing a good job of keeping her warm.

She jumped at the sound of shoes clanging against the cold metal of the bridge. She turned around and let out a sigh. Aidan stood behind her with his tie undone and a few of the buttons of his shirt loosened. He stared at her through a tuft of blonde unkempt hair, his emerald green eyes reflecting his feeling of betrayal. He shoved his hands in his pockets, walking towards the edge of platform and sitting down beside her.

"I'm glad you didn't fix your hair…" She began meekly, keeping her eyes on the traffic beneath her, "Piper told me that she was trying to get you to get a haircut…" Again, she waited for answer, before hitting her hands off her lap firmly, "Please say something… Anything…" The witchlighter pleaded, turning her head to see that Aidan was also looking at the traffic beneath them.

He let out a quiet hallow laugh, keeping his eyes to the ground, "Don't you think you should be doing the talking? I mean, you're the one who ran away." He turned to her, tapping his fingers off the red steel, "Do you not wanna get married? Or is it something else? Have I screwed up in someway?"

Paige smiled, "No… You didn't do anything… I do want to be with you… But…" She sniffed loudly, her eyes beginning to well up with salty tears that silently rolled down her cheeks, "After everything we've been through… How do I know that you're not going to leave me again?"

He raised his hand, cupping one of her cheeks with his palm before quickly pulling it away to use both his hands to take his jacket off, "You're freezing." He whispered softly, draping it around her shoulders and rubbing her arms vigorously as he moved closer to her. "I'm not going anywhere… I promised you that on the bridge in the Atlantian castle, remember?" He took her hand and gripped it tightly, trying to warm her up as much as he could, "I love you."

"I love you too…" Paige replied, snuggling into the warmth of the jacket and inhaling the mixture of cologne and Aidan's natural scent, "It's just this wedding!" She suddenly cried out, holding his hand tighter, "Piper and Phoebe took control of it… I never wanted it to be so big. I wanted us to have a great day… I wanted _you_ to have a great day! I wanted us to… confess our love for each other in an intimate and special way, not in front of a hundred and fifty people like we're on show!"

She was relieved to no end when she saw his trademark loveable grin spread across his face, laughing, "Paige, to be honest… I didn't really care much about the wedding." He bit his lip and tried to carry on, hoping he could redeem the statement that sounded so damning, "If you think about it, the wedding is like a tiny part of our relationship… If things work out, we've still got about fifty years to go! And compared to that, some ceremony that takes up one day seems a little small, don't you think?"

Paige grinned as she kissed him on the cheek, moving closer to him so she could share his body heat, "You really see us sitting like this in fifty years time?" She asked with a smile, resting her head on his shoulder. "Because I see it being a little closer to sixty…" The witchlighter smirked, entwining her fingers with his.

He chuckled, kissing the top of her head, "Will we go for broke and call it seventy? … I just want to be with you for as long as I can." Stilling holding her hand, Aidan stood up, pulling Paige to her feet along with him and smiling, "So, you ready to get married?" He asked, smirking at her confused expression.

"Are you kidding? Piper and Phoebe are going to kill us!"

"Why don't you just come with me?" He asked rhetorically, unable to keep the smile off his face as he enveloped her in a tight hug which she tried to get even closer to. Water crept up around their feet before it devoured their bodies completely. The aquatic silhouette suddenly burst, the remaining water disappearing against the metal of the bridge.

* * *

Paige could hardly believe what she was seeing in front of her. A refreshing breeze hit her instantly, blowing the strands of hair from her face and making her take in a gasp of air. She was literally walking on air; they were in the middle of the night sky. The moon shone brightly, illuminating the area well as there was no cloud coverage this high up. The stars glittered above them like a dark blanket covered in beautiful diamonds, each one of them twinkling innocently as they watched over the proceedings that were about to follow.

"I told you that I'd make your wedding heavenly…" Pamela grinned from her place at the side of the Book of Shadows, which seemed to be in the middle of the ceremony with none other than Prue Halliwell standing behind it, donned completely in a ceremonial white gown, appropriate for High Priestesses.

"I hope you don't mind me being part of your special day, Paige." Prue asked timidly with a smile before twirling, "I picked a drab gown, just so I wouldn't upstage you…" She grinned wickedly and winked at her baby half-sister, placing her hands on top of the Book of Shadows on the page entitled "Handfasting"

Paige cocked an eyebrow and smirked, shaking her head, "Oh honey, that would never happen, and not just on my wedding day." Her expression softened into a warm smile, "Thanks for wanting to do this…" She whispered to her big sister.

Penny suddenly cleared her throat loudly, making Pamela jump as she was standing right next to her, "Um, girls, why don't we get the show on the road here? I'm sure these two have waited long enough for this moment without a few dead witches exchanging pleasantries. She looked up, seeing orbs coming down from the sky, "Well, it's about time." The old witch put her hands on her hips, giving Leo a questioning look as he materialized.

"Sorry I'm late." He quickly apologized, "Meeting ran on for longer than the one yesterday…" He groaned before turning to Pamela, "I take it Piper and Phoebe are still being distracted?" The elder asked with a smirk, knowing full well of the plan that his eldest nice had concocted.

"Yeah, Annabelle's taking care of it." She replied with a hint of disdain, but decided to quickly move on from her bitterness by flashing a large smile in her aunt's direction, "And that's exactly why we actually probably should get the show on the road! So c'mon!" She clapped her hands together loudly, "Places, people!"

Paige went to move to the front of the Book of Shadows, but she suddenly stopped, pulling Aidan's hand slightly, "Hold on…" She said softly, tugging at whatever was keeping her in a knot and wrenching it from her hair, shaking her head vigorously and freeing her locks, letting them drape beautifully down her back, "Okay, ready!" The two quickly took their places, smiling lovingly at each other before Paige suddenly clamped a hand over her mouth, "Oh no! I don't have something old!"

"There's no time! _Great_ Grams will just have to do!" Pamela exclaimed, unable to keep her laughter contained as she watched Penny's face contort into one of fury as she placed her hands on her hips.

"I beg your pardon?" She exclaimed, narrowing her eyes at her great granddaughter, "Now, you listen to me, I-,"

"Grams…" Prue said with a warning tone thick in her voice, silencing her grandmother with a cold stare before beaming at the couple before her. She cleared her throat, taking a quick glance at the Book of Shadows, "We are gathered here today to unite two souls as one. Do you, Aidan Parker, and Paige Matthews, join us here of your own free will to acknowledge the eternal bond shared by both of you?"

"I do…" Paige and Aidan confirmed to Prue in unison, staring deep into each others eyes as they began. It was finally happening.

"You may join hands…" The true eldest Charmed One instructed kindly, making a small gesture to indicate her order. The two of them joined hands tightly, "Aidan, you may recite your vows…"

The elemental smiled as he looked at Paige, lowering his head and staring at his shoes before beginning, "Paige… You have no idea how much I have stressed over what to say to you at this moment, and even right now, I'm not sure. But the thing that I'm sure of than anything in the world, is how much I love you. You've given me two beautiful daughters, and a lot more chances than any sane woman would have, because God knows I don't deserve them! But after four years of trying to here, we've finally arrived, and I don't want to be anywhere else but by your side… As your husband…"

Prue pursed her lips tightly to prevent herself from breaking down with joy, "Paige…"

The witchlighter took a deep breath, blinking away the tears that had been urged by her lover's moving vows, "Aidan, I've been in love with you since the very first time we met. You rescued me, when no one could, and you've come to my rescue so many times now that you're pretty much my knight in shining armour, and you probably know how much of a big deal it is for me to call you that as I'm not big on the fantasy thing… But you are my fantasy now; you're everything I could ever want… Everything I _will_ ever want… And I know that, in the very distant future, that I will look at you and still mean every single word that I have said here today… I feel blessed to have you and thank whatever force that brought into my life… That brought you to me…"

Prue let out a single sniff, composing herself and blinking in surprise when she realized she was supposed to be continuing with the ceremony, "Um… Here before witnesses, Aidan and Paige have sworn their vows to each other. With this cord…" She made a gentle motion with her hands, causing the crimson rope that lay on the page to telekinetically twist itself around their wrists, "…I bind them to those vows."

"Heart to thee, body to thee, always and forever, so mote it be…" The two of them recited softly, not taking their eyes off one another as they felt their relationship grow stronger than it ever had before.

"So mote it be…" Prue repeated softly.

"So mote it be!" Penny, Pamela and Leo boomed in unison, grinning at the sight before them.

Prue raised an eyebrow at her new brother in law, "Well, what the hell are you waiting for? Kiss her already!" She urged, gesturing wildly towards Paige and causing the witchlighter's face to almost go the same colour as the cord that was around her hand.

Grinning, Aidan let go of Paige's hand and moved towards her, putting his hand on the back of her head and pressing his lips to hers. She returned the kiss with even more passion, arching her back as she placed her hands on his arms while he placed his free hand on the small of her back. They stayed in a fierce lip lock for a few more seconds before breaking apart, "You still going to be kissing me like that in seventy years?" Paige asked with a smirk.

Before Aidan could reply, a hole suddenly appeared in the middle of the sky, showing the hallway island of the attic steps. Piper, Phoebe and Annabelle strode in, each of them thoroughly confused by what they saw. None of them had the chance to comment on it though, as their arrival caused the sky to begin to vanish, slowly shrinking away and disappearing, revealing that they had been in the attic all along.

"It was an illusion?" Paige shrieked, spinning on her heel and glaring at Pamela, who gave her a shrug of her shoulders and a dry look in response.

"Hey, I had twenty four hours to plan a freaking wedding! Let's see you do better than this!" She spat, shaking her head and groaning before muttering something about ingrates, walking towards an old sofa and crashing down onto it.

Deciding not to give anyone a chance to react, Aidan pushed on the small of Paige's back, bringing her even closer to himself, "If you need us, we'll be in Paris for two weeks, enjoying our honeymoon!" He announced, making Paige beam with delight before yanking at his shirt and pulling him into another passionate kiss as they were devoured in a surge of water that carried them from the Manor, conveniently leaving Pamela to answer all the questions about what had just happened.

* * *

Okay guys, this story is going to work a little like "A Power Divided". Which means that some of the storyline will be focused on the Charmed Ones, and the rest will be focused on Pamela's adventures in NY! Because I can assure you, she's going to have a lot of them!

**NEXT TIME:** Pamela is pleasantly surprised to find out that piano bar that Joanne Walker worked at is still standing. Soul searching and perhaps more lie in store for her with this new discovery. Paige and Aidan spend the last day of their honeymoon doing what Halliwells do best, putting their lives on hold for innocents. Phoebe is tempted to stray when she meets a single father in the park, will she cave in?

Chapter 4 will be up soon!


	4. Lessons

**ANNOUNCEMENT:** Due to FF.N's new rule, I have opened a message board for everything about the series. The link is in my profile. I will be posting review replies there from now on, so check it out! I hope to see you here! The replies for the last chapter's reviews will be up soon!

**Lessons**

Pamela still couldn't believe that she had managed to the kind the key within all the junk that she had in the apartment. She stared at it as she rode on the elevator, the brass now dull after years of existence and lack of use. The sharp ding of the bell brought the witch back to her senses as the doors slid apart, revealing a lavish hallway that was bathed in an inviting warmth that was heaven for anyone who had just walked forty blocks in a New York November. She still remembered the place like it was yesterday. She remembered walking down this hallway after school, after a trip to the park, after going shopping, or just after going down to the lobby to get the mail. All these things culminated into the innocence that Pamela had known for a small part of her life.

However, her face fell when she saw that the door was probably the shabbiest out of all the rest on the floor. Just like the key, the brass I.D on the front had also dulled with age, the 41G now looked brown and mistreated, as if no one had tended to it in years. Hesitantly, she raised the key to the lock, not knowing if she was ready to face a part of her life which had always been too painful for her to come back to.

"You going into the old Walker place?" A voice startled her, making her drop the key. Pamela looked up as she retrieved the key, and her jaw dropped when she saw that it was her old neighbour, Mrs. Winchester, still wearing her overly large glasses and clutching to her metal cane like it was an extension of her body.

"My God, how are you still alive?" Pamela gasped in surprise. The old woman had been on her last legs when she had lived here seven years ago, how had she lasted this long? It was at this moment that the twenty year old hoped that Mrs. Winchester didn't recognize her, as she and Dean had played quite a few pranks on her when they were little.

"What did you say, dear?" Mrs. Winchester asked as Pamela stood back up after retrieving the key, "My hearing's not what it used to be, sweetheart, you're going to have to speak up a little." She urged, squinting her eyes and moving closer to the witch's face.

Pamela raised an eyebrow, cringing in the slightest before replying, "Um… Yeah, I'm going in here." She put the key into the lock, turning it and pushing the door open just as she heard a gasp of realization come from Mrs. Winchester as she recognized the twenty year old, "Uh… Bye!" She went to close the door until a metal cane suddenly shot through the crack, halting the closing.

"Why you little-!"

Before the old woman could finish her sentence, Pamela batted the cane out of the doorframe, letting the door slam violently before she hurriedly locked it from the inside, "Crazy hag…" She mumbled, before fixing her scarf from its disturbed position and raising her gloved hands to her mouth, breathing warm air onto her palms.

Pamela was almost regretting coming in here, as she felt that she probably would have been warmer outside. The witch decided that she had actually never felt colder in her life, but she had a sneaking suspicion that it wasn't just because no one had lived in it for seven years, it was because of all the darkness that had passed through this home. She had wanted to remember her first true home as a place of warmth and love, but now even her past wasn't allowing this part of her childhood to be a happy one.

Her breath, swirling heavily in front of her, temporarily clouded her vision as she stared down the foyer. A dulled glass vase filled with stagnant water stood on top of a dusty circular table in the centre of the hall. Pamela walked towards it, her heels clicked loudly off the marble floor and echoing through the chilling apartment. Gulping, she delicately gripped one of the dead flowers sitting the vase and tried to make it stand up proudly, only for it to practically turn to dust in her hand.

Walking past the table with one mournful look at the vase, Pamela walked further into the home, narrowing her eyes as they were hit with the cold sunlight streaming in the six tall windows on one side of the end room. She smiled, feeling a little bit of warmth come back to her from the fond memories she had of this room. Every Sunday morning, Joanne would give her a piano lesson. It was completely up to her whether or not she took them, but at that age and with no knowledge of the world's harshness, Pamela had been happy to spend any time with her foster mother.

The marble floor cut off at the entrance to the large oak floored room. The wood was now covered in dirt, dust, frost, and a light smattering of snow near the few broken windows on the ledge. She walked in slowly, the floorboards letting out sorrowful groans from the weight that was being applied to them, especially after so long of no one treading near them. Pamela remembered that Dean used to love the noise his remote control cars would make as they ran over the wooden floor, occasionally bumping into one of the piano legs now and again before going back to watching them race around the large open space.

Pamela gasped when she saw that it was still here. A little dirty, but it still seemed to in one piece, even after all these years. The piano, once a gleaming black wood, had now succumbed to the ravages of time like everything else in the apartment. Termites had taken a shot at it, along with the wood suffering under the cold temperatures, making it look as if the top would only be able to hold the dust on top of it and nothing more. Carefully, she lifted up the lid that had, surprisingly enough, kept the keys of the instrument in pristine condition. Her fingers danced delicately on the ivory teeth, making a melancholy tune that rang through the entire apartment, "Twinkle, twinkle, little star… How I wonder what you are… Up above the world so high… Like a diamond in the sky…" She sang softly to the tune, salty tears rolling silently down her cheeks as she did. Pamela continued with the lullaby until her voice began to crack from the grief, taking her hand away from the piano quickly and clamping it over her mouth to muffle a choked sob.

Her thoughts were suddenly broken by a source of fierce heat behind her. Pamela turned around, watching as a scorching pillar of raging flames deposited a demon with pale skin, holding his clawed hand over a large bleeding wound in his side. The evil being glared at her with eyes that were filled with anger and pain from his wound, holding out his free hand and summoning a sphere of crackling energy to his palm.

Pamela groaned to herself, raising her hands and preparing to send the demon to his torturous afterlife, before a sharp gust of wind suddenly hit her from the side. For a split second she felt as someone had grabbed her by the shoulders and threw her to the ground, out of harm's way, hitting the wooden floor just in time to see that someone had actually pushed her to the ground.

It was the guy from the roof.

He took the time to quickly shoot her a charming grin, his electrifying blue eyes boring into her soul within a matter of seconds before he turned his attention back to the demon. He threw the back of his jacket out, pulling an athame from the back of his jeans and hurling it towards the demon. Pamela frowned when all she saw was a blur move out from the side of his body as the athame moved with more force and speed than she had ever seen something throw one.

It hit the demon's shoulder, the blade going right through bone and flesh. He let a loud scream, moving his hand away from his side and going to pull the athame out before releasing the energy ball that he had originally conjured to attack Pamela with. The attack struck the guy hard in the right hip, causing him to go into a vicious spin in the air before landing on the piano, the brittle wood giving out instantly and smashing to pieces with a series of mournful bum notes as it was destroyed.

"Son of a _bitch_!" Pamela suddenly spat, throwing her hands out in a violent gesture, blowing the demon up and reducing him to a mass of swirling fire and descending ash that quickly died down in the bitter cold of the apartment, the athame falling from the air with a thud as it hit the wood.

Getting to her feet, she walked towards where the dagger had fell and picked it up, examining it for a short period of time before walking over to the remains of the smashed piano, seeing that whoever this guy was, was bleeding heavily from his side. She let out an angry sigh, "You better have a good reason for crushing my piano…"

* * *

Phoebe let out a groan as her head fell to the mattress. She had turned the entire house upside down looking for it, taking apart the living room, looking in every single nook and cranny of the kitchen where it might have come loose. She had even attempted to take apart the pipes of the kitchen sink to see if it had fell off while she was doing the dishes, but it had ended with a flooded kitchen and a five hundred dollar plumbing bill from the extensive damage her handiwork had caused. And now, as she finished practically tearing apart her bed, her wedding ring was nowhere to be seen.

"Mommy!" Connor shouted from downstairs. Phoebe turned to her bedroom door and let out a tired sigh. Her son was probably too hot now, as she had had wrapped him up in thick clothes in preparation for going to park, before a brainwave about her wedding ring's location and she had rushed upstairs. The middle Charmed One couldn't blame her son for being flustered, as she had also been dressed for the winter before taking apart her bedroom and now had a fierce pink glow in her cheeks from the 'exercise'.

Accepting that it was indeed lost, Phoebe grabbed the beige woolly hat that she had ripped off during her search, placing it back around her head and over ears before taking a quick glance in the mirror to make sure her long brown locks were sitting in an acceptable manner to her, "I'll be damned if a piece of jewelry is going to come before my son…" She growled to herself, roughly pulling her gloves over her hands in a defiant manner as she walked down the stairs, only to be confronted by very hot and bothered three year old, who could only glare at her as Phoebe had made sure he was wrapped up to the middle of his nose.

"'Bout time yous got hewe!" Connor accused his mother, his voice muffled underneath the collar of his jacket and the navy blue scarf wrapped around the bottom half of his face. Phoebe raised her eyebrows at the expression, knowing that her son had probably picked up the phrase from the many times that he had heard his Aunt Piper say it to his mother.

"I know, sweetie, I'm sorry, but…" She knelt down, taking his hands, "You haven't by any chance been the pretty ring that Daddy gave me a long time ago, have you?" She asked with a hopeful glimmer in her eye that faded when Connor shook his head from side to side, "No… Of course you haven't… Alright! Let's go!"

Phoebe grabbed her keys from the small table at the door, accidentally knocking a picture of her and Brennan off the surface. It hit the floor with a small cracking noise, signifying that the glass that kept the photo protected had smashed. Phoebe bit her lip for a moment, before turning away from the broken picture and opening the door, letting Connor bolt out the into the frosty grass of the front lawn. She looked at the picture from the other side of the door before catching up to her son, too blinded by her own emotions to realize that the picture was a perfect example of how she felt.

A shiver ran down Pamela's spine as her hand came into contact with the icy cold water cascading from the grimy sink tap in the bathroom. She looked at her reflection in the mirror in front of her as best she could, as the reflective surface had been encrusted with frost and sheer age. Anxious for the bowl to fill up, she turned the knob on the tap so the water came out quicker. "Christ…" She breathed to herself as splashes of water hit her hands.

Finally, the dirty bowl had been filled with a sufficient amount of water and she turned the tap off, walking out of the room and heading back towards her mystery man, who was sitting on the edge of the window, holding his hip to stop the blood from oozing out of his wound. Pamela set down the bowl on the ledge, whipping off her scarf and rolling it into a flat wind of fabric before setting it down next to her gloves.

"You shouldn't have pushed me out of the way. I can take care of myself, whereas you obviously lack some talent in that department." She opened the conversation, keeping her eyes on what she was doing and only giving him a quick glance as she dipped her scarf into the bowl of water.

He raised an eyebrow, which was hard to see underneath the mass of tousled brown hair, "Well, you sorta distracted me with that gawking you did when I saved you…" A smirk played on his lips when Pamela began to lift up his shirt, "Do you really think this is the time or place?" He grinned.

She gave him a venomous stare, "First of all, you didn't save me, it was the other way around. Second of all, me and you? In your dreams. And third of all…" She pressed the damp scarf hard against the gash in his hip, making him elicit a loud wince, "… This might sting a little…" The witch held the scarf over the bowl, wringing it out tightly and staining the water in the bowl with a thin redness that clouded the once clear liquid. "I'm still waiting for my apology."

"For what?"

"For reducing one of my few childhood memories to a pile of rotten wood," Pamela turned her head towards the remains of the grand piano, now a mass of broken shafts of black wood and large tangled strings that had once plucked at the keys, "Okay… I think that'll do, you're lucky it was just a graze. Although you could have got through it without getting hurt if you hadn't pushed me out of the way." She smirked as she wrung out her scarf for the final time, setting it down next to the bowl of bloodied water.

He laughed, looking at the floor before facing her again, "Sorry… So, I guess your thoughts about how I got away on the roof so quickly have been answered, huh? I mean, any other person who saw what you saw would have ran out the door and left me for dead. What makes you so different?"

Pamela let out a chuckle as she smiled at him, "Wow, getting thrown into a piano really did a number on you. Although after years of getting thrown into furniture, I guess my resistance has just gone up a little bit… You really didn't see what I did?" He shook his head, "Let me demonstrate. See that vase over there?" She pointed to the cloudy vase that she had inspected when first entering the apartment. In a lazy fashion, she raised her fist, outstretching her fingers abruptly and causing the glass object to shatter instantly, shards of the once clear material flying off in different directions before falling to the floor. A puddle of water soaking the dead flowers that now lay pathetically on the table.

"You-you… blow stuff up?" He stammered, obviously a little scared of just what this girl was capable of.

"Amongst other things. It's just one of my many powers. I'm guessing molecular propulsion is one of yours?" She raised an eyebrow, glowering at him slightly.

The guy grinned bashfully, "Someone certainly knows their mutant powers, and it's my only power." He held his hands up in a surrendering fashion, "No more surprises, I promise."

Pamela smirked, wringing out her scarf one more time and stuffing it in her jacket pocket before pulling her gloves back on, "Oh, now I certainly doubt that. We all have skeletons in our closets, including me…" She grinned, breaking the tension, "But having the whole magical thing out in the open sorta takes the edge off, don't you agree?"

"Definitely!" He grinned back, shifting his t-shirt back over his lower abdomen, "So… Just what were you doing here anyway? Not many girls like to hang out in abandoned apartments, and, to my knowledge, not many girls treat a demon attack like an everyday occurrence."

"I am not telling you a thing." Pamela said flatly, "… Not until you tell me your name." She bargained, holding out her hand, "Why don't we try this whole introduction thing again? I'm Pamela." She greeted, looking into his aquamarine eyes. They seemed to have a softness that she hadn't seen before.

Smiling, he took her hand and took it vigorously, "I'm Keith."

* * *

Annabelle flipped through the beautifully preserved pages of the Book of Shadows. She moved a strand of dark blonde hair behind her ear, her eyes narrowing at every word on the page in front of her, just so didn't miss anything. The mercenary wanted to learn as much as she could from this book while she could, as she knew that staying here couldn't be a permanent arrangement. It just wasn't her to settle down anywhere, especially not in a house already occupied by a full family.

Although even she had to admit to herself that she had found a good friend in Piper. The eldest Charmed One had opened her home to her, without knowing hardly anything about her. Annabelle smiled mournfully to herself as distant memories of her past flooded her mind. There had been a time when she had been that trusting. All it had taken was for one event to happen. It had changed her forever, forced her into doing things and learning of things that she had never wanted to know of.

She raised her left arm, looking at the back of her wrist and shooting a searing glare at what was there. A red bird, with its wings outstretched proudly, stood tall, rolling over the veins in her wrist. It was a phoenix; something Annabelle had gained when she had learned their ways, becoming one of the most coveted and feared assassins of the magical world. If only those who feared her could see her now, babysitting three children and a dog while living in a basement.

Her head shot up at a shout that she immediately recognized to be Emma's. The twins and Paige's pet had been staying at the Manor during the newlywed's honeymoon, "ANNY!" The toddler screamed from the bottom floor, panic evident in her voice as she shouted Annabelle's name over and over again.

Without a second's hesitation, the blonde's body burst suddenly into a swarm of buzzing particles that shot downwards, trickling through the holes in the floorboards and trying to get to the ground floor of the house as soon as possible. The particles swirled around each other in a tornado-like fashion in the centre of the foyer before reforming into the mercenary, who immediately ran to where the child's voice had come from.

She bolted into the kitchen, frowning when she saw both Lorna and Melinda standing in the alcove doorframe, staring at something in the enclosed space. "What's wrong?" Annabelle asked. A look of worry spread over her when she thought of what could have happened to the child that she had grown to adore in a fortnight.

Melinda spun around, her bright blonde hair whipping around over her shoulders as she frantically pointed to whatever was in the alcove, "Puppies!" She suddenly exclaimed, jumping up and down excitedly and shakily pointing, "Sandy gots babies!" The toddler wailed with even more excitement while Lorna stood next to her with her hands placed firmly over her eyes.

"Gwoss!" The little redhead cringed into her hands, separating some of her fingers so she could make eye contact with Annabelle, "Dewe's lotsa blood!" She pouted at the woman in front of her to show her disgust at seeing a dog post-labour.

Stepping past the two children, Annabelle's jaw dropped when she saw that the duo had been right. Little Emma was down on her knees, tenderly stroking the head of her beloved pet. Her baby blue pants had soaked up some of the blood that was on the floor, "She's tiwed…" The toddler solemnly informed Annabelle as she too got down to her knees.

Sandy lay in her basket, her golden fur covered stomach rising and falling very slowly as her eyes drooped from exhaustion. Blood had stained everything in the dog bed, but there was no mistaking the six practically motionless creatures lying next to her. Puppies, each of them were barely moving after only being truly in existence for around twenty minutes. Annabelle moved her hand towards one of the six babies, earning a low, protective growl from their mother. She had already become extremely protective of them.

"Um… Okay," The mercenary cringed as she realized she had to handle the situation by herself, "Melinda, could go and get me the phone and piece of paper next to it from the little table at the bottom of the stairs?" She calmly asked the toddler, knowing that Paige had left a list of numbers in case of emergencies, one of those numbers being for the vet.

"I's on it!" Melinda confirmed nodding her head firmly before racing out of the kitchen and into the dining room, heading towards the small table in the foyer, where she would find what she was looking for.

"Lorna, could you please get me some newspapers from that stack that Piper keeps out the back door for recycling?" Annabelle turned to the little redhead, knowing that she didn't appreciate the graphic sight before her.

"Eh… Kay!" She finally answered, scuttling past Annabelle and heading to the back door, all the while keeping her sight straight ahead of her to avoid seeing Sandy in such a state from an even closer place. She leapt up slightly, yanking at the door handle and causing it to fall open, letting in the cold momentarily as she rushed to the pile of papers.

"Okay, Emma, you stay here with Sandy and keep her calm, okay? I'm going to go and get one of those big boxes that your Uncle Leo's new computer came in." She said, standing up and silently hoping that one of the boxes was big enough for a dog and her six puppies.

"Why?" Emma asked, her childish curiosity getting the better of her as she frowned up at Annabelle, all the while lovingly patting Sandy's head.

"Because we don't want Sandy and her babies sitting in all that blood, do we? We need to get them into a nice clean space… I think." Annabelle added uncertainly. She didn't really know what she was doing; only going on instinct as she stormed towards the basement, knowing that that was where Leo had shoved the old boxes.

"Hewe you go!" Melinda and Lorna announced in unison as they returned with the things that Annabelle had asked them to retrieve. The blonde sighed, running a hand through her long locks before resting them on her hips. She went over to Melinda, gently taking the phone and paper from her hands and placing them on the kitchen table before heading towards the basements steps and shaking her head.

This was _not_ what she had been hired to do.

* * *

Phoebe let out a delighted squeal as she flew down the slide, Connor, who was sitting on her lap, seemed equally amused by this, laughing loudly and grinning as his mother came to a stop at the end. The middle Charmed One sighed with relief as she pressed her hands against her cheeks, warming her face up for a slight moment before exposing them to the brunt of the morning cold once more. She barely had time to stand up from the edge of the slide before Connor was bouncing up and down on his feet, pulling at her hand.

"Mommy, let's play socca!" He said enthusiastically, pointing frantically to the soccer ball in the bag that Phoebe had brought with them. She raised an eyebrow at the checkered ball sitting at the top in her bag, she was sure that she hadn't brought one. A smile spread across her lips when she realized that her son must have slipped it in when she had gone upstairs.

"You know what, sweetie? I'm gonna need to take a rest…" She announced pointing to the bench where her bag was sitting, "So if you're going to play soccer, then I want you to stay where I can see you, okay?" The little boy nodded furiously, "Okay then! You stay on that patch of grass. Don't go running off or you're going make Mommy worry real loads! Alright? Okay!" She handed the ball over to her son, smiling at his grin before watching Connor run off to the blank patch of grass, dropping the ball to the ground and beginning to kick it around with a small amount of force.

Phoebe sat down, smiling as she brought out a flask of hot coffee that she had prepared in advance. She grinned as she poured the hot liquid into the top of the flask, before taking a grateful sip. "Ah… Beloved coffee… You'll never leave me in the lurch." She said with a hint of disdain, taking off her gloves so she could take in the warmth of the cup fully, giving her hand a sad look. It just looked bare without her wedding ring. The witch looked up, trying to hide behind her coffee cup when she realized that the man, who was pushing his daughter in a swing, glanced her way again. Phoebe had to admit he was handsome. Tall, clean shaven and a head of messy dark brown hair that seemed to fit perfectly with his look.

Phoebe went back to drowning her in her coffee cup, her chocolate brown eyes keeping a subtle look on the man. He caught her stare, and she immediately tipped her cup so high that the coffee spilt out onto her jacket. The middle Charmed One yelped with shock, practically throwing the plastic lid to the ground as she stood up, grimacing at her coffee stained coat.

"Wow… You take drowning in your coffee cup to a whole new level." Phoebe looked up and saw that the man was standing right in front of her, holding out the plastic cup that she had just dropped. She looked down, seeing that his little girl was holding his hand while glaring up at her. The toddler reminded her of her two nieces. Wavy blonde hair swept up in pigtails, while her luminous pink jacket hurt Phoebe's eyes in the morning sun.

"Ha! Ha…" The witch smiled nervously, absentmindedly dabbing the coffee stain on her jacket with one of her gloves as she stared into the man's calming green eyes, "Yeah… I guess I just didn't realize how… _scorching_ hot you-! I mean, how hot my coffee was." She silently screamed with embarrassment when she realized that cold coffee was now dribbling down her chin, quickly wiping her face with her glove and grinning.

"Mommy, you okay? I heard ya sceeming." Connor asked urgently as he run to her as fast as his little legs would carry him. Even at the age of three, Connor was aware what a scream usually meant in his family. "Is he a-?"

Phoebe quickly cut her son off, seeing a twinge of voltage at the edges of his son's eyes, ready to blast any threat towards his mother, "-Very nice man who gave me back my coffee cup!" She beamed, giving a look to Connor that told him the man was safe to be around. "He's very protective of me." Phoebe explained to the man, "It would probably help if we knew your name, just to make sure you're not a bad guy." She smiled, letting him know that she was humouring her son.

"I'm Isaac." He introduced himself, holding out his hand before slowly retracting it, "I would… But you seem to be a little coffee logged right now…" Isaac grinned, looking at Phoebe's coffee covered hands and pursing his lips to stop himself from laughing.

"Phoebe." She replied, shoving her hands into her pockets and smiling weakly before noticing an odd glint in Connor's eye. She frowned, catching her son's look and immediately recognizing what it was, "Um… Connor? Why don't you go play with…?" She looked towards Isaac for the name of his daughter, who was still shooting an uncertain glance at the middle Charmed One.

"This is Kelsey." Isaac introduced his daughter, beaming down at the little girl before kneeling down and giving her a kiss on the forehead, "Listen, you go play with that little boy over there, okay? I'm gonna be here, so make sure you stay where I can see you. And if a stranger comes up…"

"Wun to you!" Kelsey suddenly replied, this was obviously something that she had been taught from an early age, making Phoebe feel a little inferior as a parent. Just because Connor had powers, it didn't mean he was safe from the evils of the real world.

"That's right! Now, you go have fun!" Kelsey gave one last heated look to Phoebe before scampering off with Connor towards the large patch of grass that the little boy had been playing on only a few moments before.

"His father not around that often?" Isaac suddenly asked, catching Phoebe off guard as he walked past her and sat down on the bench, smiling at her bewildered expression before taking out a cell phone and sighing at the screen. "Work… I sorta didn't tell them I was taking the day off to spend time with Kelsey."

Phoebe smiled, walking back to the bench, "Oh… Then I guess we have something in common. Although a little tip for the next time you do this? Leave all communication devices at home." The phone began to ring in his hand, making him sigh in frustration, "Do you just hate cell phones?" She asked rhetorically, taking his phone from him and opening it up, before closing it again, "Always out of range." She winked as she handed it back.

He laughed, putting his phone back into his pocket, "Impressive! Although I don't think I'll be doing this again, actually, more like I won't be able to this again." Isaac said sadly, before flashing her a charming grin, "Because I don't usually meet beautiful and street wise women in the park!"

Phoebe was glad that her cheeks were always red from the physical exertion of chasing an energetic three year old all morning, as if they hadn't been flushed, her embarrassment would have shone through immediately. "And I certainly hope you don't make a habit of saying stuff to every woman you meet." She retorted.

"Sorry. Did I make you uncomfortable? Am I going to have Connor's father hunting me down in a jealous rage?" Phoebe avoided his eyes, looking down at her hands and rubbing the place where her wedding ring normally sat around her finger, "… You never did answer my first question…"

"Um…" She took a breath, staring hollowly at her bare finger, blinking away the tears that threatened to unleash themselves upon her features, "No, Connor's father isn't the picture…" Phoebe separated her hands, turning slightly so she could face Isaac completely, "He left me and his son alone a long time ago."

* * *

Pamela stood on the edge of the room. Every single piece of glass had been shot out of its window pane. Glass littered the floor around the windows, which now just looked like large holes in the wall. The marble fireplace, once a fixture of warmth and grandeur, had been reduced to a dull piece of rock on the side of the room. All the furniture was either overturned or had been blasted apart in the battle that had happened all those years ago.

She felt a hand on her shoulder, whipping around and taking a defensive stance before realizing that it was only an extremely surprised Keith, "What do you want? I thought you left already…" She growled, looking back to the room and sighing before turning back, "Your eyes annoy me." Pamela suddenly stated, surprising the mutant a little, "They're supposed to be a window into your soul, but yours make it hard for people to keep eye contact with you, so no one really ever knows what you're like. Are you going to say _anything_?"

"Not until you tell me why you're still here." He replied simply, leaning against the opposite side of the door and trying to catch her eyes, "Did you ever think that's it only you that has a problem with keeping eye contact? Maybe you don't want people seeing into your soul…"

"What?"

"You seem like the kind of person that would have some serious trust issues with everyone you meet…" He said philosophically, "I can understand that. Being punched in the gut by life one too many times does that to a person… causes them to close up into themselves." He walked into the room, examining it carefully before turning back to Pamela and looking at his feet, "This is where they died… Isn't it?"

"What are you? A psychology major?" Pamela spat back, her nostrils flaring and her eyes widening with rage. She stormed into the room after him as he crossed the floor towards one of the smashed windows, running his finger along the empty pane, "Let's get a few things straight here: The first time I meet you, you super speed outta there after a few minutes. I don't see you for months, and now you think you can come in here and start doling out crap like that? You don't even know me…"

Keith sighed loudly, turning back around to her, "I'm sorry… I know that this must be hard for you to deal with. Especially after me crushing your piano." He smiled, walking past her and heading towards the door, "And about me not knowing you?" He stopped in the doorframe turning back and finally catching her glance, "Why don't we do something about that? I'll buy you lunch."

She pursed her lips, narrowing her eyes at him. For some reason, his gaze was a lot easier to hold now. Pamela suppressed the urge to laugh at herself as she realized that he had totally manipulated her, and she had fell for it. She had to give him credit though, he certainly had tried, "Sure." She began to walk out, yanking at his jacket sleeve as she left the room, "Oh, and that trust thing? You're _so_ wrong."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are."

"No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are!"

"Alright! Jeez!"

* * *

Phoebe fidgeted nervously as Isaac handed her his card. She hesitated for a few seconds before holding out a shaky hand, grasping the piece of cardboard slowly and refusing to look the man in the face. She closed her eyes, strands of her hair falling down in front of her face before she realized that he was talking to her, all the while not even noticing that, as he talked, Phoebe had been stroking her wedding ring finger, "Wh… What…?" She stuttered, looking up and giving him a torn look.

"Don't you want to give me your number?" He asked, getting out a pen and raising his fist, ready to write the numbers she called out to him.

She sighed, scrunching up her eyes before finally making a decision, "I gave it to you… It's already on your hand…" She said hoarsely, pointing to his completely blank hand while her power of telempathy silently worked its unique ability across his mind, manipulating both memory and sight.

Isaac frowned and looked down towards his blank hand before grinning and shaking his head, "Oh yeah! Sorry, my mind was away with me… I'll give you a call sometime…" Phoebe knew the effect that her power had spun would ware off eventually, and when it did, Isaac would be kicking himself for accidentally cleaning the non-existent number off his hand.

She didn't respond as he walked off, picking up his daughter and carrying her out of the park. Phoebe looked up to see that Kelsey was giving her the first look of happiness that she had that morning, obviously pleased in thinking that she had drove away a woman who was interested in her father.

Connor, however, did not look so pleased. He was a little older than Kelsey and had been able to recognize the exchange from other times he had seen men flirt with his mother. Usually, she shut them down immediately, but what had been so different about this time? Scowling at Phoebe as she stared off into space, the toddler turned and began to run as fast as he could, holding back the tears of betrayal that were beginning to sprout from his eyes.

"Sweetie, where are you going?" Phoebe questioned when she realized her son was on the move. He kept running, if not even faster than before, "Connor?" She said, a little more loudly as she walked briskly to catch up to him. The middle Charmed One lay a hand on Connor's shoulder, not expecting what was about to come her way.

Her muscles tensed up and her eyes widened as a powerful electrical current spread from her fingertips and through her body. Her person began to jerk on the spot as Connor, in his intense emotional state, unintentionally flooded her body with as much voltage as he could muster. A bright blue blast ignited between Phoebe's hand and Connor's shoulder, hurling the three year old to the ground as his mother was shot backwards, landing in a crumpled heap on the frosty grass.

Connor's glassy blue eyes widened as he looked towards the smoking form on the grass. He stood there, stunned, "Mommy…?" He whispered faintly. She still didn't move. "Mommy!" The toddler yelled, running towards Phoebe and tripping over his own feet in the process, falling to the grass harshly right next to his mother. Ignoring the pain in his now scraped knee, he yanked at Phoebe's jacket sleeve roughly, pulling her onto her back, and shaking her arm, "Mommy! I'm sowy! Pees wake up!" He babbled loudly at her, his eyes widening with hope as she began to come to.

Phoebe groaned from the tension that still coursed through her body, struggling to sit up. She watched as Connor seemed to become even more distressed at her awaking, instantly leaping at her and wrapping his arms tightly around her stiff neck. It took her a moment to remember what had happened, before comforting her son in a tight hug, "Oh, honey! I know it's not your fault! I'm sorry!"

"I huwt you…" He sniffed, looking into Phoebe's eyes as he silently begged for forgiveness, clambering onto her lap and hugging her again. The middle Charmed One began to cry as she comforted her son, now seeing that she wasn't the only one missing Brennan. In fact, Connor probably missed him more than she did. "I just…" He hiccupped, "I just… didn't like dat man…"

"Connor…" Phoebe sighed, gently wiping away his tears away before lovingly rubbing his bruised knee, making it feel better in a way only a mother could, "You don't need to worry… I sent the man away and I love your Daddy very much…" She bit her lip, how was she going to explain to her son the temptation to stray from his father, the man who he idolized? "You know that day when all your cousins were busy doing other stuff, and you had no one to play with…?" He nodded, "Well, it's a little like that for me. I feel very sad that your Dad's not around a lot…" She began to well up, "I miss him so much… But I'm really angry with him too."

"Why?" Her son asked, innocence shining brightly in his eyes. Phoebe hoped and longed that his eyes would always stay the same.

"Because he's missing so much with you! Your first day at pre-school… You kicking a soccer ball around the park…" She looked up, revealing that she was now crying as much as he was, "… And as much as I want to hate him for it… And get back at him for it… I can't… Because I realized today that I love him too… _damn_… much, and I know that what he is doing, he's doing for us…" She sniffed, looking back down to her lap, "I'm lonely, Connor…"

"You have me…" Connor offered meekly, giving her the faintest of smiles, "Wight…?" He asked uncertainly, making Phoebe grin with pride and love.

"Absolutely!" She exclaimed, suddenly wrapping her arms tightly around her son and pulling him close to herself, kissing his cheek and stroking his hair through his hat, "As long as I have you, I'll never be alone…"

* * *

"Okay, how about you go into the kitchen and get the pizza menu? We'll order in for lunch." Phoebe smiled; kissing Connor's cheek as she finally released him from the loving grip that she had had him in ever since their breakthrough in the park. She smiled as he run through the front door. She was about to shout to him to watch the glass from the broken photograph, only to realize that it was no longer there anymore.

Her heart instantly began to pound with fear as she realized that she had just let Connor into the house alone when there was a potential intruder. "Connor…?" She called out warily, her fear growing even larger.

The toddler came running out of the kitchen, standing at the doorframe and jumping up and down energetically, "Mommy! Come see!" He exclaimed, running back into the kitchen with excitement that confused her even further.

She walked through the living room, heading towards the kitchen and nearly falling from shock when she saw who was sitting at the table. Phoebe walked into the room slowly, taking off the hat that she had been wearing to protect herself from the cold, "Hey…" She breathed.

"Is that the only greeting I'm going to get?" Brennan cheekily replied, pulling out of his hug with Connor and standing up, holding out his arms and beaming at his wife, "Surprise…" He murmured, knowing that he had told Phoebe that he wasn't going to be back until New Year.

Phoebe walked towards him, throwing her arms around his neck and pulling him into a hug that she wished could last forever. He pulled back, giving her access to kiss him fiercely and tighten her hold on him. She inwardly smiled at how right this all felt. What had she been _thinking_ earlier?

She finally released him. Brennan smirked as he ran a thumb over his own bottom lip, letting out a chuckle. Phoebe noticed his wedding ring on his finger as his hand passed over his face, "Wow, I should go away more often if this is the welcome back I get."

"Don't you dare!" Phoebe hit him playfully on the chest, "Jerk. Did you lie to me about when you would be back just so you could a pull a stunt like this?" She smiled, "Because, it definitely seems like something you would do… Not that I don't like the surprise and all…"

"Well… I was going to stay through the winter… But then I realized that I didn't want to leave you guys alone on Christmas." He turned around, grinning at Connor, "Especially this little guy! Although you're not so little anymore! How much have you grown since the last time I saw you?"

Connor laughed, practically jumping up to his father, "I missed ya, Daddy!" He stated, smiling at both of his parents.

"I missed you, Connor." Brennan said back before giving a serious glance at Phoebe and letting his son down to the floor, "Hey, why don't you go and get all the stuff that your Mom's bought you. I wanna see what the damage to the bank is." He winked at her, causing her to blush.

"Okay!" The toddler confirmed, running out of the kitchen and bounding up the stairs, leaving his two parents to talk.

"I found this." He walked towards the kitchen table, picking up something and showing it to Phoebe, making her squeal with delight when she saw that he was holding her wedding ring. Identical to his own in every single way.

"Oh my God! Where did you find it? I have torn this house apart trying to find it!" She shouted enthusiastically, taking it from him and staring at it before putting it back on her finger. It was there she felt it, a small shiver down her spine as the ring was returned to her hand. It was the same shiver she felt at Brennan's touch, his words, his kisses, his love. He was all she wanted; he was all she would ever want.

True love.

* * *

The next chapter will be up soon!


	5. I'm Dreaming Of A Right Christmas

**I'm Dreaming Of A Right Christmas**

Aidan rubbed his forehead as he knelt down in front of the cardboard box, armed with a large black marker as he turned to his wife, who was sitting in the bed, lazily sprawled out as she looked through the newspaper and real estate magazines. "Okay… What am I calling this one then?" He asked wearily, staring at Paige through his glasses as she looked up, glancing at the items peaking out from the top of the box.

"Um… Shoes, dash, formal." She ordered, before patting his side of the bed, "Hun, just leave the rest of them for tonight and come to bed and look at these with me. You were saying you were cold, so come join me under the nice warm covers." The witchlighter smirked at him before going back to the brochures in front of her.

"Well, we might as well get it done if we want to make your insane deadline for finding a house. I mean, c'mon, Paige. Be realistic. What's the chance of us finding somewhere between now and New Years? It's Christmas! People want to stay in their homes, not leave them!" He argued, standing back up and stretching his arms above his head before shivering.

"I told you to come to bed if you're cold…" Paige murmured sassily, looking up and frowning as he walked towards the large windows and trying to close them, "Hey! Leave them open!" She ordered, clicking her fingers repetitively and scowling at her husband's back before he stopped and turned around, giving her a look that showed his complete confusion perfectly.

"Sweetheart, it is so cold out there that I wouldn't be surprised if the Bay had totally frozen over in the morning!" He narrowed his eyes, "In fact, now that I think of it… You've always done this in the winter. Why?"

She shrugged innocently, "I guess I just don't feel the cold like you do…" Paige said softly, trying to cover up the fact that her arms were covered in little bumps, a sign that she was feeling the cold, "Besides, maybe if you wore more than a t-shirt and boxers to bed, you wouldn't be freezing…"

Aidan folded his arms, goose bumps also showing up on him, "Don't try and change the subject…" He smirked, recognizing his wife's little quirks, one of them being that she didn't like talking about the things that embarrassed her, "What is it?" he moved closer to the bed, sitting down on the side.

"Alright… fine…" She grumbled, rolling her eyes before taking a deep breath, "You make me feel safe." Paige began simply, "And I'm not about to outright ask you to hold me sometimes. The cold makes you snuggle up to me in your sleep… and I feel safe…" She laughed at herself, shaking her head, "God, I sound like such a loser."

Aidan slowly took his glasses off, folding them up and holding them in his hand, "So you're telling me that you've had me freeze my ass off every winter for the past four years… Just to get a little hug?" He tried to hold back his laughter, "You could have just asked, my other girlfriends used to ask, I used to wonder why you didn't. I just figured it was a personal thing."

Paige's jaw dropped, scowling at him and lightly hitting him on the bare part of his leg, "Excuse me! There will be no talk of past hussies while you're in or on the bed you share with your wife and the mother of your children… Speaking of kids, we need to move out. Fast."

Aidan groaned, taking her hand and trying to wear her down, "Paige, what's the big rush to move? I know Mrs. Phelps wants us out now that we have seven dogs, but she said she'd give us till the end of January."

"We wait until the end of the month, and we won't be able to take one step without stepping on kid's toys or dog turds." Paige flatly stated, scowling at the masses of houses that stared at her from the pages of the brochures, "We will soon be overrun by children and puppies, and I do not want that to happen in a cramped apartment that was only meant for two people in the first place!"

"But we haven't even been able to put up the Christmas decorations for the girls yet. They're getting a little confused with all the boxes…" He looked around, scanning each box, "By the way, where did you put their presents?"

"In the box marked "Aidan's Socks" I doubt they'll go in there, they'll want to avoid the smell!" She smirked devilishly, making him give her a mischievous grin in return, "Okay… We'll abandon out house search for tonight…" Her gaze softened into one that expressed the rare vulnerability that Paige hardly ever let show, "… As long as you warm me up."

Aidan smiled at her, "Deal." He agreed, pushing the magazines off the bed carelessly. The rest of the apartment was a mess anyway, what were a few more brochures on the floor? He climbed across the bed as Paige turned the lamp off on the nightstand, getting under the covers and enveloping his wife in his arms, "You're always gonna be safe…" He whispered, kissing her neck lovingly before nestling into his pillow.

"I know…" Paige smiled deliriously, holding on to the wrist of the arm he had around her waist, tracing circles in his skin and smirking with a content look on her face as she slowly fell into a peaceful slumber, subconsciously still tracing light marks on her lover's arm.

* * *

Phoebe stifled a yawn as she sunk into the squishy couch of the Mulwray household's living room. She raised her coffee to her lips, rubbing her eyes with her free hand before jumping at the sudden shriek emanating from the kitchen. The middle Charmed One spun her head around to see her sister in law being roughly shoved the room by hands that shot from the kitchen.

"That's it! Out of my kitchen! Out, out, out, out, OUT!" Allison screamed as she practically threw her younger sister out of the kitchen, "I have a giant meal to prepare and you come in here asking for _coffee_? Get _out_!" She shouted, before Phoebe heard a loud sigh of annoyance and the loud clomps of Allison's heels against the wooden floor as she stormed back to whatever she was doing.

Sandra blinked a few times before fixing her curly blonde hair back to the way it had been before her little sister's assault, "God… She goes completely crazy on Christmas Eve. I can't even get a good breakfast!" She seethed, shaking her head before her eyes brightened at the sight on the living room table, "Ah, Pheebs! You're a lifesaver!" She exclaimed, practically leaping onto the sofa and grabbing a bagel.

"I grabbed as much as I could before she screamed at me too. We have coffee, cereal, bagels…" She snuggled back into the couch, wrapping her hands around her coffee mug, "I figured if she's anything like my older sister, then she would want the kitchen to herself."

"Good thinking!" Sandra enthused, flopping down into a large armchair, grabbing a donut from one of the cardboard boxes on the way down, taking a large bite before cursing quietly at the jelly that had spurted out onto her pajama top, "Damn… Oh well." She shrugged before taking another bite. Growing up on a farm had given Sandra a lax concern to dirty clothes. "Nelle should be coming up soon. You can finally meet her husband and judge!" She grinned, putting her finger into the sticky red substance on her top and licking it off.

Phoebe set her mug down, "I'm more interested in meeting my niece for the first time!" She exclaimed, picking up her bagel. Nelle had certainly been busy in the last few years, moving to the city and finding what she wanted out of her life. Now, she had a husband and a one year old daughter that the middle Charmed One was extremely anxious to meet.

"Aww… Clare's a little cutie. I can't blame you for wanting to meet her, although you could have done it a lot sooner if you visited more…" Sandra casually dropped into the conversation. "Look, you don't need to be with Brennan to be allowed in here. You're welcome anytime, especially since my asshole of a big brother leaves you high and dry for most of the year." She looked around, frowning, "Speaking of… Where is he anyway?"

Phoebe nodded towards the large staircase that led upwards to the other three floors of the house, "Still sleeping. I think he's enjoying sleeping on a comfy bed. Unlike what he has had to sleep on while he's been away." She said quietly, picking her mug again and taking a sip.

Sandra smirked, "Yeah… Either that or he didn't get much sleep." Phoebe eyes widened as her cheeks turned as a rosy pink almost instantly, choking on her coffee slightly, "Don't worry, I was the only one who heard. Staying in the room next to Brennan's all through his teen years sorta gives you a heightened hearing of sorts about these things."

Phoebe stared at her youngest sister in law in shock, "You eavesdrop?"

"What? Oh! God, no! As soon as I hear anything I hightail it outta my room and head down for early morning television and three cups of hot chocolate. It usually puts me out right on the couch, so if you find me snoring on the sofa, you know someone got lucky the night before." She smirked, winking at Phoebe and taking another chunk out of her bagel. "Wow… I really thought the snow would have let up by now. It just seems to be getting worse."

Phoebe looked towards the window. The landscape was completely shrouded in a layer of thick white snow. Flakes flew around in front of the glass, making it look as if a fierce blizzard was raging outside the four walls, "Yeah, it's even worse this morning. But at least we're getting a white Christmas!" She beamed, but her smile faded when she saw Sandra's look.

"Trust me, sweetie, when you have a white Christmas every year, it sorta loses its 'wow!' factor." She replied with a melancholy tone, before looking to towards the stairs and smiling, "Morning, guys!"

Phoebe turned to see Brennan coming down the stairs, Connor leaping down each step at a time before his father suddenly lifted him up, bringing him down the staircase at a quicker rate and entertaining the toddler even more. Both of them were dressed for the bitter cold and snow outside, with thick jackets around them and hats and scarves leaving only their eyes visible.

"Hey, we're just going outside to feed the rabbits." Brennan explained, pulling down his scarf and planting a hasty kiss on the top of Phoebe's head before picking up his son, "Okay, you ready to face the big bad blizzard?" He asked, making Connor nod furiously. "Alright then! Let's go check on those poor bunnies." Brennan turned to his wife and sister, grinning mischievously, "Brace yourselves."

Phoebe frowned, "Brace myself for-?" She was cut off when Brennan suddenly pulled the front door open. A bitter gust of winter wind blew into the living room, along with a thick cloud of snowflakes that, if the door had been left open for much longer, would have made a small snowdrift in the house's entrance.

"My God!" Sandra said loudly, rubbing her bare arms furiously in an attempt to warm herself up. "He always used to do that as a kid and I still hate him for it. Damn…" She looked to Phoebe grinning innocently and raising her eyebrows, "Any chance I could jump into your coffee cup for a heat?"

* * *

"What do you mean? How can do you not do it? You guys are the head honchos up there. If you can't do it, tell me who can and I'll go yell them into submission." Piper snapped, halting her pacing for a brief moment as she spun her head around, her thick brown hair moving with her and landing on the opposite shoulder she had turned with. "It's Christmas, for crying out loud! Have a heart."

Odin eyed the witch carefully, fidgeting with his hands underneath the thick gold and white robes that two of his fellow Elders were also dressed in as they stood as his sides, "And what exactly makes you think that you can just summon us forcefully away from our haven and start making demands? If anything, we should be making the demands. Your attitude to your duty as witches lately has seen atrocious." He spat, sneering in a way that Piper loathed this particular Elder for.

"You're going to need to narrow it down for me. Are you angry at the fact that we didn't fight any demons for a year? Or that we've hired Annabelle to do some extra demon killing for us? Because lemme tell ya, it's a pretty sweet deal." The eldest Charmed One said with a gleeful tone, happy to see all three Elders flinch slightly. "So now that we've gone down the road of trying to dodge my question, let's get back to the main reason you're still standing my attic without me scattering your orbs across the room." Piper snapped sweetly.

Odin composed himself. He wouldn't allow a witch to make him lose his temper, although the Charmed Ones had certainly pushed his patience to its limits on many occasions. "I find it rather interesting that, after everything you've put us through during your time as witches, you think that you can still make such ludicrous demands."

It took Piper a few seconds to get a handle on her mounting rage as his last statement, "Everything _we've_ put _you_ through? Let's see… During our time as witches, you didn't allow me and Leo to get married, you didn't let us see Prue for years after she died, Leo was once again taken away from me when you guys paid for just sealing the Titans away instead of destroying them, and let's not forget the numerous times you've all just stuck your heads in the sand to let us deal with everything, so don't you dare try and act like the victim here, pal!" She returned to the empty pedestal where the Book of Shadows usually resided, feeling better about the fact there was something between her and the three Elders, "Oh, and by the way, you're hardly my first choice for this. I've basically exhausted every means I have, so just for one day, let-," She was cut off by the sounds of disturbance at the base of the house, frowning as she focused her hearing.

"GOD DAMNIT!"

Piper groaned at the loud voice that screeched through the house, "Pam…" She snarled viciously, her nostrils flaring as she locked eyes with Odin, "I'll be right back," She snapped, stomping across the room to the door and disappearing down the attic steps.

Odin exchanged knowing looks with the two Elders that had been summoned with him, before all three were enveloped in the cloud of blue and white lights that they had summoned to devour them. Each figure became unrecognizable as the three plumes of orbs shot towards the ceiling, fleeing the scene before they were grilled by Piper any further.

* * *

Piper raised her hands into an offensive position as she crept down the stairs. For all she knew, the disturbance had been caused by a demon attacking just as her niece had arrived and she had had to fight. But her face turned into a scowl and she lowered her hands when she saw the scene that was currently unfolding in the foyer. "You really have got to kidding me!" She growled to herself, running down the steps and weaving past the three kids, who had communed on the stairs to laugh.

Pamela's limbs flailed underneath the large Christmas tree that had toppled on her. Piper had decided to put the tree in here this year, as people would see it as they walked in the door, and people sitting at the dining room table would have a nice view of a beautifully decorated tree. Pamela, however, was tangled in the lights, struggling to shove the large tree off of her.

"Oh…" Piper growled, grabbing one of her niece's wrists and pulling her out from underneath the tree, "… You are _so_ cleaning this up! I didn't spend two hours setting the damn thing up just for you to kill it violently with an off kilter transportation spell…" She wrenched Pamela to her feet, "What are doing under my tree anyway? Don't you usually take the plane here?"

Pamela took a breath blinking a few times and rubbing some of the tree's needles off her face, "Well, I thought that all the flights would completely packed, since it's Christmas Eve, so I decided that using magic would be quicker and easier, but… Why are you giving me that look?"

Piper frowned, pointing at her niece's head with a perplexed expression, "Why is there a tiny wing in your hair?" She pointed into her hair, grimacing slightly as she plucked something from Pamela's head. She shook the rosy pink wing a little, disturbing small silvery particles of dust that fell to the floor.

"Oh, I was fighting for some cosmic airspace. That bitch of fairy will think twice the next time she takes me on." She said proudly, before her face fell at the look of horror on Piper's face, "Oh please, she was asking for it. She blew fairy dust in my eyes to try and distract me. Besides…" She grabbed the wing away, waving it around casually, "They grow back instantly and I needed her to be preoccupied for a few seconds."

Piper blinked a few times before turning on her heel and heading towards the kitchen, "Well… I really don't know what I can say to that!" She snapped, "And fix that mess!" She shouted, before shoving the swinging door to the kitchen and entering the room.

"Nice entrance, Pam." Wyatt sniggered, eliciting giggles from both Chris and Lorna as they peered the through the spaces in the banister, watching as Pamela stared at the Christmas tree, still currently on the floor.

She spun around and glared at her eldest little cousin, "Little man, do not pull the sarcasm card on me, because you know that I will kick your tiny butt _and_ withhold any presents that I may have brought with me…" She mentioned casually, glancing at the smaller of her two suitcases that had somehow landed unscathed, unlike their owner.

"Pwessies!" Lorna suddenly exclaimed, jumping excitedly up and down on the stairs before racing down the steps with her two older 'brothers' and racing towards the suitcase Pamela had looked at. They were thwarted by their eldest cousin, however, when she sidestepped in front of them to block them off.

"Okay, you guys, I'll make you a deal. I've got a few presents for each of you, and as long as your Mom allows it, you can open one tonight. But you've gotta help me get the tree back up. Deal?" She raised an eyebrow, before shooting a perplexed expression at Wyatt and Chris, who were now exchanging a mischievous grin with one another.

The two siblings suddenly shot their gaze towards their downed Christmas tree. Chris' hands suddenly shot out, wriggling his fingers and standing the tree back up with a burst of telekinetic energy. Wyatt made a few more complicated gestures with his hands, smiling as the entire scene was swallowed up in a swathe of orbs. Pamela could see trails of orbs moving around the tree, before the haze of glowing spheres slowly faded, leaving every light, ornament, and bauble exactly how they had been before Pamela had crashed into it. The twenty year old narrowed her eyes, seeing tiny amounts of blue and white lights picking up the hundreds of needles that had fell to the floor, before vanishing and taking the mess on the floor with them.

"Nice work!" Pamela grinned, to her two cousins, now noticing that there were already a mass of presents underneath the Halliwell-Wyatt's household tree. "Now it's we girls turn to do the finishing touch…" She commented, picking up the large Silver Star that hadn't been retrieved in Wyatt's orb clean up. "Let's do this!" She handed in the finishing touch of the tree to Lorna before picking up the toddler and holding her as high as she could, "That's it, sweetie. Right on the top!" Lorna grinned to herself as she placed the star on the top of tree, touching the base to make sure it was secure before being brought down to the floor.

"Can we open a present now?" Wyatt asked, hopeful eyes gazing up at his big cousin, occasionally darting to the suitcase.

Pamela smiled, "No, I said you could open one tonight, and since it's only two in the afternoon, that doesn't constitute as tonight, so you're going to need to wait a while!" She taunted, secretly glad that her little cousins didn't push the issue, as she hadn't even wrapped one present up yet.

Piper came back out of the kitchen with the Book of Shadows underneath her arm, the silver triquetra gleaming from all the Christmas lights that had been put up in the house. She folded her arms, holding the book over her chest as she inspected the newly recovered tree, "Well, everything seems to be in order…" She murmured, before turning to Pamela, "So why was casting a transportation spell such a labour?"

"Well, it seems the holidays are a busy time for the magical community as well, hence the little spat with the fairy, and hence the somewhat rough landing." She explained simply, sneering at the fairy wing that was now on the floor, "Now it's my turn for questions. Why was the book in the kitchen? Were you cooking up some revenge for when we said the turkey was a little dry last year?"

Piper rolled her eyes, heading for the stairs, "No, I was exhausting every branch of my powers. C'mon, help me grill an Elder or three. I could use the support." She said in a low voice, before snapping at the three children in the foyer, "And don't even think about orbing those presents out of Pam's suitcase, or I'll bind all your powers." She threatened, causing all three of them to pout as their mother and cousin disappeared to the next floor.

"What could you use my support with?" Her mouth fell open as she realized, "Oh, is this the thing that you were telling me about when I came for Paige's wedding? You _still_ haven't found a way?" She asked with a shocked tone as they climbed the attic steps, "Wow, they're really keep him under lock and key, maybe he-,"

"Damnit!" Piper exclaimed as they entered the attic, scowling at the now empty room before craning her neck backwards and shouting towards the ceiling, "This isn't over, you know! I'll find a way!" She screeched, before walking over to the pedestal and slamming the tome down on its altar. "I don't know what to do anymore. I've tried the Power of Three, I've tried summoning, I've tried location spells, scrying…" She ran a hand through her hair, "If this book can't help me, what can?"

Pamela gave her aunt a sympathetic look as she lowered herself into one of the tired old armchairs that littered the attic, "Have you ever thought that maybe it's just not supposed to happen? I mean, you're planning to bring him down for one day, and then he disappears again. Have you thought what kind of damage that could do to-,"

"I know, I know… But I can't keep doing this. Not to myself, to Leo and especially not to her, she needs to know where she comes from, maybe that will resolve this potentially emotionally scarring mess that I've got myself." She smiled wryly.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Piper seemed to hesitate, before nodding slowly. Pamela rose to her feet, placing her hand on the midnight blue cover of the book before opening it, "Then I'll do everything I can to help…"

* * *

"What is this?" Paige droned as she stepped out of the lobby of her apartment building, shoving her hands in her pockets and shaking her head. Before Aidan could even respond, she spoke again, "I'll tell you what this is. It's you giving in to your daughters." She said sassily, folding her arms and trying to ignore her children's looks of pleading as they stood next to their father.

Aidan flashed her a grin, gesturing to the top of his car, "Actually, it's just a tree." He offered meekly, seeing that she wasn't buying it from the expression on her face. The tree itself seemed to be rather large, hanging over the front of the car and obscuring the view through the windshield. "Look, just hear me out before you shut this down completely…." He began, "Our apartment right now, is a mass of cardboard boxes with only a few things still out. We still have, at best, three weeks in that apartment." She opened her mouth to protest, but he cut her off, "And don't say that we'll be out by New Years. That's ludicrous and you know it." The elemental lent his elbow on the roof of the car, looking at the tree before glancing back at his wife, "So why don't we give the place a proper send off for all the happy memories it's given us? With your powers, we could have everything out of those boxes in a matter of minutes, so unpacking wouldn't be a problem… Just imagine…" Aidan walked up the steps, putting his arms around Paige's waist as he smirked, "… We can get the fire going… Watch some corny holiday movies with the kids… Then set the presents out properly under our beautifully decorated tree, instead of having them shoved in a box with my socks."

"I don't know…" Paige hesitated, looking for her children to help decide what to do.

That, however, proved to be fruitless, "Pees Mommy!" Melinda and Emma whined in unison, scrambling up the small flight of steps and flinging their arms around Paige's legs, looking up at her with eyes that Sandy's puppies had been giving her for the past month.

"Cute… If extremely pre-rehearsed." She shot a knowing glance at Aidan, before groaning and rolling her eyes, "Okay, fine! I cave, let's go the whole ten yards…" She sighed, smiling at her daughters as they cheered, jumping up and down on the stairs before tugging at Aidan's jean leg, urging him to get the Christmas tree into the house. "There's just one problem… How are we going to get that tree up to the apartment? The elevator is too short and the stairwell is too thin."

"You just leave those unimportant details to your extremely skilled husband…" Aidan grinned, glancing at the Christmas tree and shrugging, "No problem at all!" he assured her, pulling her close and warming her up.

Paige smirked into his jacket, "You're going to get it into the lobby and just splash it up, aren't you?"

Aidan blinked a few times, before trying to suppress his smile, "Like I said, leave those unimportant details to me." He repeated, leaning down and kissing her lovingly, swearing to himself that he would never admit to Paige that she had been right about his plan.

* * *

Pamela lent her head back as a mushroom cloud of smoke flew up from the copper potion pot with a resounding boom. She coughed a little, swiping away the smoke her arms before peering into the pot cautiously. "I don't think summoning rituals are supposed to do that…" She said to herself, sighing as she rubbed her temples. The witch turned to her aunt, who was basically standing asleep at the book, "Anything?"

"Nah…" Piper replied wearily, flipping by another page and taking her elbows off the book as she stood to her full height. "I'm starting to think that maybe you were right about this. It's just not meant to be…" She flipped another page half heartedly, "I'll try one more spell then call it day…" She glanced at her watch, "… At five minutes to midnight. How appropriate."

The faint sound of buzzing reached their ears. A swarm of particles began to form a tornado in the centre of the room, before clustering together and forming Annabelle, her face obscured by dirt and soot from spending hours battling in the Underworld. "Sorry I'm late…" She murmured, wiping her brow and swiping the back of her hand over her eyes.

"Finally! I've been calling you for hours. Did you get any leads?" Piper asked hopefully. She had sent Annabelle to see if any demons knew why there were obstacles in front of a task that a witch like Piper could usually easily handle.

The blonde shook her head, setting her scythe down on the table and flopping down into the sofa, "I exhausted all my sources. They know nothing, either that or their pain endurance has increased since the last time I saw them." She looked to Piper, pursing her lips, "I'm sorry."

The eldest Charmed One was about to respond, before a column of blue and white lights descended through the ceiling, landing right beside her and depositing her husband at her side. Immediately, Leo held a piece of mistletoe above Piper's head, grinning victoriously, "Gotcha." He said triumphantly, leaning down and kissing her on the lips, still smiling afterwards, "That makes the score three-two to me."

"Damnit." Piper cursed, stomping her foot like a small child before grinning, "Well, if you're allowed to use your powers, then…" She thrust out her hands, freezing her husband and halting his movements completely, giving her enough time to wrench a piece of mistletoe from her pocket and hold it above Leo's ahead. She used her free hand to make a turning gesture, unfreezing him and delivering a quick peck on the lips, "We're tied again." She said with a grin.

Leo sighed, looking defeated, "Okay, new rule, no using powers…" He said meekly, spinning the mistletoe in between his fingers and pouting slightly.

"Uh… Someone wanna enlighten me with this whole exchange here?" Pamela asked, pointing between her aunt and uncle with a perturbed look. "You're husband and wife. I wouldn't have thought kissing each other would be something you have to be forced into doing. Well, not yet anyway."

Piper glared at her eldest niece, "Well… Leo said that I was easy to catch out with mistletoe. So we've got a little game going on. Whoever has had the most kisses off their partner by the end of Christmas Day, wins the game."

"What's the prize?"

"Well, for Leo, it's the chance to actually be right-,"

"And for Piper…" Leo began, shooting a playful glare at his wife, "It's the chance to eat her own words and realize that I am right." He grinned, "I'm gonna go downstairs and see if I can catch the rest of 'National Lampoons Christmas Vacation'." He announced, casually putting the mistletoe behind his back as he did.

Piper exchanged a look of weariness with Pamela, before sighing, "I think we'll join you. There's nothing else we can do…" She said meekly, walking towards the door with her hand in her husband's. "You coming, Pam?"

"Yeah, I'll clean up this potion tomorrow. I've still got presents to wrap anyway. I'm glad the kids forgot about that deal I made…" She groaned as she stood up, walking towards the door, "You coming?" She snapped with an unfriendly tone to Annabelle, who was now standing at the Book of Shadows, flipping towards the demon section.

"No." Annabelle said back with the same amount of venom, "I want to check out a few-," She was cut by her surprise when a spiritual wind blew through the room, disturbing the pages of the book and causing them to flip forward a few times. Annabelle leapt back, reaching behind her back and pulling an athame from the holster that was strapped to her person. Her hard brown eyes darted around the room suspiciously before she noticed the casual look of the three veterans of the house. "What was that?"

Piper waved her hand, sneering, "Don't worry, it just does that sometimes to give us a little push in the right direction. Although it's more of a shove at times… You get the idea." She looked the page the wind had opened the book at, her eyes widened and a smile appearing on her face as an idea rushed through her mind. "Of course…"

"Of course what?" Pamela inquired, moving towards the book as Piper walked over the potion pot that was still smoking from the potion that had been instantly vaporized on combustion. "Elementals? How does that help us? Apart from telling us what we already know of course." She waited for an answer, frowning when Piper began to throw ingredients into the empty potion pot. "What are you doing?"

The eldest Charmed One shoved her hand into the bowl of crystallized amber grains, taking a handful of the substance and holding it above the copper pot, "Summoning!" She replied strongly, roughly hurling the amber into the pot.

A bright flash suddenly erupted from the pot, along with a large plume of smoke that blasted Piper to the floor. She composed herself, moving her hair away from her face and watching with amazement as a small cloud of pale orange lights floated from the cauldron. They swirled around each other furiously, before flying towards the centre of the room and creating a tornado. A figure began to form in the centre before there was another blight flash of light, leaving a person standing in their wake.

Piper smiled at her work as she stood up, grinning from ear to ear as she walked towards the person she had summoned, "Hello, Grant."

* * *

Phoebe sat up slowly in her bed, glancing at the digital clock on the nightstand and mentally groaning. It was only five in the morning. The middle Charmed One had always woken up on insane hours on Christmas Day. It was part of the excitement that had never faded from when she a little girl, always getting up and waking her Grams, asking her if Santa had come yet. She threw back the cover, sighing as she swung her legs over the side, landing on the floor.

Brennan, feeling the disturbance, groggily turned over with his eyes barely open. "You okay, sweetheart?" He asked kindly, rubbing her back.

She turned around and smiled as she stood up, shoving her bare feet into her slippers, "Yeah, I'm fine, I'm just gonna go downstairs and get a glass of water or something… Maybe watch the snow for a little bit." She opened the door, stopping half way out of the room before turning back around, "Hey, Brennan. Merry Chr-," She was interrupted by a resounding snore as Brennan turned his back to her. "Typical…" Phoebe murmured, smiling as she left.

Phoebe came down to the bottom of the stairs, stopping at the final step and staring at the large Christmas tree that sat in the living room. When she had first walked through that door last week, Phoebe had expected the tree to run up through the hollow centre of the house, all the way to the top floor, but then she realized that there were some wonders even a family of magical pros couldn't pull off.

Her train of thought was broken by the sound of hoarse coughing coming from the kitchen. She frowned, it was five a.m., no one should have been up at this time. The coughing ruled out it being either Clare or Connor, as if it was one of the kids, she would be extremely surprised at the intensity of the coughing fit that the child was currently going through.

She stepped into the kitchen, looking around the large space before noticing someone standing at the window with their hands at each side of the sink. Phoebe moved closer, trying to get a better view of the person. It was a woman, so that ruled out David, Nelle's husband. It wasn't until the woman raised a withered hand with a wedding ring on to cover her mouth when Phoebe realized it was Julie Mulwray.

"Are you okay?" Phoebe asked, her voice full of concern, especially when her powers began to inadvertently channel what her mother in law was feeling. A tightness in her chest seemed to constrict Phoebe's breathing, causing her to cough in a similar fashion before finally getting a handle on her abilities.

"Yeah, honey. I'm fine…" Julie whispered hoarsely, picking up a small container that the middle Charmed One assumed to be medicine, and shaking out two pills from its inside. She threw them into her mouth, taking her glass of water and gratefully swallowing a large amount of the fluid, "Ah… That's better." She commented, her voice back to the smooth and sassy tone it had before her coughing fit, "What are you doing up so early? I thought you city folk liked to sleep in as much as possible."

"What were the pills for?" Phoebe asked cautiously, keeping a stony gaze on her mother in law, briefly flicking her sight towards the plastic container that had been in Julie's hand a moment ago.

Julie frowned a little, picking up the container and smiling, "Oh, these? Don't worry, they're just vitamins. All part of getting old and all…" She said with a smile on her face, turning back to the window to watch the snow fall. "You don't need to worry about it. And don't go telling Brennan that you found me choking up a lung in the early hours of the morning! He'll start fretting over me and I can't stand worrying my kids."

Phoebe's eyes narrowed in confusion, moving to the counter top and trying to look her mother in law in the eye, "Um… I'm sorry, but I can't ignore the panic and dread that I'm sensing from you, and these is just stray emotions I'm picking up, I'm not using my powers." She sat up on the counter, "What's wrong?"

"It's really nothing…" Julie let out a chuckle, "The doctor just gave me those to keep my heart in check. It's been acting up a bit lately, so these…" She picked up the container, turning it a few times and inspecting the label, "… Just keep the old ticker going! It's really nothing to worry yourself about, hun. Like I said, all part of getting old… So, you all packed up for leaving today?"

It took Phoebe a while to answer, as she was composing herself after feeling a sudden wave of sadness wash through the room, all of it emanating from her mother in law, "Um… Yeah, my sister would kill me if I was for… I'm sorry, but I can't sit here and just pretend something's not wrong when I know there is." Julie sighed with frustration, "What are the pills for?" Phoebe asked with a lot more conviction than the first time.

"Like I said, they're for my heart…" She said gravely, lowering her head as she took another sip from her glass of water, "Except it's not as light as I first said… Actually, it's pretty damn serious." She let out a chuckle, falling back into a coughing fit the moment she began.

"Just how serious?"

"Look at it this way; this might be my last Christmas… Which is a shame, with all the kids that we look after gone for the holidays and you packing up and going home today, it's going to be pretty lonely." She sighed, before surprising Phoebe with a large beaming grin, "But I don't want you to think about such things on Christmas Day, of all days! So why don't you go back to bed, sweetheart?"

"Look, I certainly wouldn't mind staying here for Christmas. I mean, this place is the perfect setting…" She gestured towards the window, where snow was still falling outside, "… And this house is so warm and inviting…"

Julie put her hand up, shaking her head, "No way, you should spend Christmas the way you want to, not just because I had to get all nostalgic and start verbally weeping all over the place! You should be with your family, and be thankful that you're so close to them. It's good to have a lot of people in your life that love you." She smiled, putting her hands on Phoebe's shoulders and turning her towards the door, "Now, you go on back to bed. My grandkids are going to be waking up soon and you're going to need all the energy you can get to wrangle them! Trust me."

"Okay…" Phoebe replied meekly, shuffling her slippers towards the door with her head down, as if she was a child that had been punished for misbehaving. "Do you want me to tell Brennan about this? Or-,"

"No. Don't say a word to anyone. I don't want them fussing all over me. If there's one thing I would hate more than anything, it would be to have to depend on my children; it's my job to look after them, not the other way around. Besides, they're terrible when it comes to taking care of sick people." Julie seemed to shudder at a memory she had.

Phoebe's eyes widened with sympathy for her situation, "Oh, I know. I mean, Brennan may be a doctor, but when it comes to looking after me, he's just horrible at it. Shoving a thermometer in my mouth every three seconds, and filling me with chicken soup until I burst!" She placed her hand on the doorframe, smiling fondly, "But that's just part of what makes me love him…"

Julie smiled wistfully back at her daughter in law, "I'm glad you've made my son so happy…"

Phoebe pursed her lips, before grinning, "Me too." She smirked, turning towards the stairs, her smile vanishing as she thought of her mother in law's situation. She bit her lip, walking up each step with her sense of guilt getting stronger and stronger. This could be Julie's last Christmas, and it was far from what she wanted for it. But what could she do? The middle Charmed One bit her thumbnail, before grinning inanely as a plan formed in her mind. She was going to attempt to please everyone with this, although she wasn't too sure if Piper would go for it.

* * *

Grant timidly watched from the edge of the kitchen as Lorna shook around a large sheet of wrapping paper, putting it over her head and falling into a fit of giggling. He smiled fondly as the toddler seemed to be having more fun with the present wrappings rather than the presents themselves. The paper fell from Lorna's head; her blue eyes looking over the edge of the wrapping with an innocent glint, making his smile grow even wider.

"Weird feeling, isn't it?" Aidan asked rhetorically as he came out of the kitchen, standing next to Grant as he stayed hidden within the doorframe, "Seeing your kid play around at Christmas for the first time. Although, this is you seeing your kid for the first time in general, so I guess it's a little different."

Grant didn't even make eye contact with his old friend, keeping his eyes on Lorna as she started to roll a basketball on the floor that little Emma had received for Christmas, "She's so big… I mean, I remember seeing her all bundled up in those blankets before I died, but… It's so weird seeing her now, like this…"

"What did Piper tell her about you?"

The former earth elemental bit his lip nervously, "Piper hasn't told her anything yet, she's giving me time to get my head around this…" He sighed, bowing his head, "I mean, what do I say to her? The only parents she has really ever known are Piper and Leo, how's she going to react if I tell her that… you know." He looked at Aidan, raising his eyebrow, "How do two year olds normally react to shocking news?"

"Honestly? I have no idea!" Aidan laughed, "My girls are usually too hyper to care about anything other than playing, fighting with one another, or driving Paige up the wall." He smiled as he watched the twins run around, holding wrapping paper behind themselves like capes, "Every kid is different. You'll never know unless you try…"

"Unless she's inherited any of Emma's powers, that is. She's already inherited my elemental heritage, what's to say she doesn't have the knack for being an empath? Where is Emma anyway?" Grant frowned, looking around the immediate area, "I would have thought she would want to see her daughter opening her presents."

Aidan blinked a few times, frowning darkly at what his old friend had just asked. Deciding that he had to get more information, he tried to pass his question off as a joke by laughing, "What? You mean you haven't seen her?" He chuckled, "I'm surprised that…" He hesitated, trying to figure out how to word this, "… Since she can orb, she hasn't came to visit you at least once."

"The last time I saw her, she was bleeding to death, and I was kneeling down to heal her. She… did survive, didn't she?" He asked with a tone that voiced both fear and hope as he looked towards Aidan.

The water elemental didn't hesitate, "Of course she did! She's just really busy with empath stuff. You know the people she deals with feel the loneliness even more during the holidays." Grant nodded, obviously believing what Aidan had just told him, "Although, you shouldn't mention Emma around the girls." He added, nodding towards the kitchen, where the Halliwell woman resided at this moment, "They're a little pissed at the fact that she's just left her daughter alone today."

"My lips are sealed." Grant said seriously, nodding firmly and going back to watching Lorna while Aidan tried to process the information that he had just received from the deceased man.

Emma wasn't with him in the afterlife? Aidan frowned as he thought of every single way this could have happened. The circumstances surrounding her death certainly hadn't been normal. Her spirit could have been affected by the way her body had died. Her soul could have been destroyed completely or she could have been thrown into a hellish pocket realm where she would spend an eternity of torture.

There was another possible reason that Aidan thought of. That Emma had not yet earned the right to an afterlife, that destiny wasn't finished with her yet. Maybe she wasn't even dead and she was in a parallel dimension somewhere doing who knows what. All of these theories, however, still didn't help Aidan come close to an answer to the question that now burned in his mind.

Where was Emma?

* * *

"Hey! No touching!" Piper snapped as Pamela's hand shot out, wanting to dip her finger into the trifle that sat on the dining room table and take a bite, "Pam Walker, I swear to God, if I turn my back and you take a scoop out of that trifle, I will cut off the finger in question…" She said menacingly, the threat having a better effect as Piper was holding a long knife in her hand. "I need to get all this stuff ready and onto that table, so anyone who attempts to sneak a bite will be getting jack. Paige, are you sure you can orb all this? It's not going to be too heavy?"

Paige gave her sister a sullen look from the table as she sat with Melinda on her knee, helping her brush the hair of her new doll, "Piper, I think I can orb a table of food. Give me a little credit at least. I'm actually surprised that you went along with moving everything to Brennan's Mom's house, seeing as how you fight tooth and nail to be the hostess every year."

"And I don't hear you complaining when I'm the one cooking…" Piper shot back, putting her hands on her hips, "And besides, Phoebe told me something on the phone that made it special circumstances, so I'm doing this out of love for my sister. If you wanted to stay in Atlantis and have a big Christmas banquet, I would happily oblige to come along with my food."

"Aw…" Paige smiled and cocked her head, letting Melinda down so she could run out of the kitchen and find her sister, "Really? Well, I'll just have to keep that in mind for next year." She said absentmindedly, waiting for Piper to snap at the very thought of having to move everything to a new location.

"Of course, given the roughness of Atlantian transportation, all the food would probably be all over the place the by the time we got there." Piper said sweetly, hurriedly putting on a pair of oven mitts as she bent down towards the oven, "Okay, people, get ready for the mother bird to land!" She yelled, opening the oven and bringing out a large turkey that looked like it had been cooked perfectly, just like everything else that had been put onto the table.

"Okay, seeing as how the turkey is out, do you want me to go and get the kids ready? You said Phoebe told you that it's snowing up there, so maybe winter jackets are in order." Paige suggested, earning a look of confusion from Piper.

"Why? You're going to orb all this stuff directly into the house; they won't need to go through snow to get there!" She exclaimed, setting the turkey down on the table in its tray with a clang, putting her hands on her hips so she could give Paige her full attention.

"Oh, c'mon, Piper. Kids, snow, we're hardly going to able to keep them apart when they see it. And I, for one, would not like to be the one to tell them that they can't go out because we didn't come prepared." Paige sassily replied, not waiting for an answer to rise for her chair and through to the dining room, "Okay, guys! Go and get your jackets! It's snowing where we're going!"

Pamela smirked, "Wow, she just couldn't wait to drop that little bomb, could she?" She didn't get an answer as Piper was busy shifting everything around on the table, "So, what was it that Phoebe told you that made you change your mind about the venue? Did she work some psychic mojo on you or something?" She pursed her lips, holding back her amusement.

"No." Piper replied flatly, "It's nothing, she asked me not to say anything anyway, so it doesn't matter." She went back to busying herself with everything on the table, all the while not noticing Leo sneak up on her from the kitchen doorway, slowly raising his mistletoe above her head. Piper turned around, and was immediately met with the sight of Leo's chest, "Damnit!" She let her arms flop to the side, glancing up quickly and sighing before kissing her husband.

"I do believe that's… seven-five to me." The Elder said smugly, resting his hands on the side of the island in the centre of the kitchen, "Everything looks great, honey…" He commented, turning around and going for the same trifle that Pamela had went for, before a warning glance from his niece told him to do otherwise, "So when are we leaving?"

"Um… Soon, Paige is getting the kids ready so when she comes back, we'll be ready. Listen…" She began, moving towards her husband and putting her arms around his neck, "I was thinking I could share my news with everyone tonight? You know, to give a little bit more to the holidays?"

"Sounds great, as long as you think you're ready to tell everyone." Leo said back, unaware that Pamela was listening intently on their conversation.

"Well, it's pretty much for definite, so… Yeah, I want to tell everyone." She kissed him, slyly sliding a piece of mistletoe from her sleeve and holding it above his head as she maintained the lip lock before pulling back and grinning as she waving the plant in his face, "Seven-six." The eldest Halliwell stuck out her tongue, before looking towards the door as Paige entered with the children, each of them holding jackets, gloves, and hats in their hands.

"Okay, the kids have got their coats; we've got our coats…" Paige held up the mass of jackets she was holding, one for each of them, "… And the food is ready, so I think we can get outta here now." She walked over to the table, placing her right hand on the kitchen table, as it held everything that they were wanting to take to the Mulwrays, "Okay, everybody grab an end, and me and Leo will orb."

Everyone took a place the table, each of them putting their hands somewhere on it, whether is was the edge of food bowl, the side of the table, or, for the younger kids, the leg of the table, everyone was connected. Leo and Paige activated their respective abilities, slowly devoured by a manifestation of blue and white lights that consumed both their bodies before traveling outward to the people or object they were touching. The instant everyone and everything was a mass of orbs, they shot through the ceiling, dissolving as they did and leaving the Manor.

* * *

The table erupted into another bout of laughter at one of Nelle's stories from when they were kids. Brennan and his father Connor had gone fishing for the day, but they had returned just two hours later when Brennan, even more impatient than he was now, shot a tesla coil into the water, bringing around twenty paralyzed fish to surface, therefore ruining the activity.

"Oh, you should have seen their faces!" Nelle exclaimed as she brought her glass of wine away from her mouth, "Dad just looked so angry, but you could tell he was trying to hold back his laughter at the same time. And Brennan…" She turned to her sister, "Ally, you remember better than I do, I was a little distracted at the time."

"Yeah, that's because you had been making out with that hot farm hand that Mom that had volunteered over the summer." Sandy smirked, looking around the table as everyone looked towards her, "Needless to say, Nelle 'persuaded' him to stay on for a few extra months, without any payment."

"At least not any payment that can be discussed with little ears at the table." Allison added, looking towards her niece, Clare, and grinning at her as she tapped her little nose with her index finger, "Your mommy was a naughty girl, wasn't she?" She asked, her gaze flickering towards Nelle.

"Uh huh!" Clare nodded, taking some more juice from her sippy cup as her mother's jaw dropped.

Nelle glared playfully at Allison, reaching over her daughter and hitting her sister lightly on the arm, "Way to turn my own daughter against me, Ally!" She turned back around to see David with an eyebrow raised, "Oh, honey. Don't listen to them; they're making me sound like a little tramp."

"Well, it certainly explains a few things." He began, a smile starting to appear on his lips, "Now that I know that you've honed certain talents from a young age…" Everyone began to laugh again as Nelle's face turned red, shoving her wine glass to her face and taking a large sip.

"I wish we had some magical hi-jinx from when we were kids," Phoebe mused, "We just had the usual teenage stuff going on…" She looked disheartened by that fact, sinking into the chair even deeper.

"Yeah, but when we first got our powers, we acted like kids." Piper pointed out, sitting up a little more at the table as she addressed Phoebe, "Like the time we cast that spell to find our perfect guy, even poor Kit was stalked by horny tomcats!" Both she and Phoebe laughed at the memory while Leo and Brennan sat with anxious looks on their faces.

"What's this? You guys cast a love spell?" Brennan asked his wife, who put a hand on his shoulder reassuringly.

"Oh, honey, don't worry about it. Besides, it turned us, literally, into guy magnets. I think Prue was the one who got the best deal; being stalked in her dreams by a serial killer who she eventually shoved off the edge of a building in her mind…" Odd looks greeted both Phoebe and Piper, "Oh, it's a long story…"

Paige snorted with laughter, "I still can't believe you guys were stupid enough to cast a love spell, after all the lectures you gave me about magic when I started out!" She giggled, shaking her head as she took a sip of her wine.

"Well, we learn through doing, which is something you almost wore out, Missy Paige! So don't go getting on your high horse after all that body switching, personal gain, and let's not forget the _infamous_ breast enhancement!" Piper gloated, making Paige's jaw drop with embarrassment.

"Point made…" Paige said lowly, taking another sip of her wine, "You can all stop looking at my chest now!" She joked, causing another bout of laughter to go through the table.

During the laughter, Phoebe managed to catch eye contact with Julie, who was laughing just as hard as everyone else until she caught the eye of her daughter in law, both of them shared a silent understanding before Julie mouthed, "Thank you." Phoebe smiled back slightly, "You're welcome." She mouthed back, before her attention was brought to Piper lightly hitting her glass with her knife.

"Okay, you guys." She stood up, putting a hand on Leo's shoulder for support as she did, "If I could have your attention for just a little minute…" She looked down at her husband, "Um…" She turned towards everyone, smiling, "Come January, there's going to be a new addition to my family," Everyone perked up at this, immediately thinking that she didn't look pregnant at all, "I have… decided…" She raised an eyebrow, "To do something that I've always wanted to do, and that is to open a restaurant. P3's doing well, my family is happy, and I'm in a good place, financially. So… if there ever was a time to do it, it would be now…" Everyone sat in silence for a few moments, taking the information, "Feel free to say anything!"

Pamela sat dumbstruck for a few moments, before putting her hands on the table and giving her aunt a shocked expression, "I _can't_ believe you're _not_ pregnant!"

* * *

"Okay, ladies…" Piper began as she bent down and started to roll a handful of snow into a tight sphere in her gloved palm, "What do you say we take these girls to school, huh?" She turned to Pamela and Paige, who where doing the same thing with the snow around their feet.

Pamela shrugged, grinning as she molded the snow, "Well, you know I like to wash down my turkey with a can of whoop ass. Let's do it!" She said enthusiastically, shaking the snowball in her hand as if to test how heavy it was, "They don't stand a chance!" The witch eyed three Mulwray sisters, who were standing across from them.

"Hey! Halliwells!" Sandy shouted, "We've had snow every winter of our lives, you guys are _so_ going down in a snowball fight!" She said confidently, swinging her arm back and pretending to hurl the snowball in her hand. She was unpleasantly surprised when none of the three women flinched at her bluff.

"Oh yeah?" Paige hollered back, "Well, we've seen demons throw fireballs for years, so we know when someone's about to launch a projectile or not! Bluffs won't work on us! You either have the guts to throw that thing, or you don't!" She challenged them, "You know, this isn't how I pictured us settling a three century old feud between our two families."

Pamela shrugged again, wheeling back her arm, "Well, I'll take what I can _get_!" She grunted, hurling her snowball across the space between them and Mulwrays and hitting Sandy on the back of the head.

"Oh, and they're off!" Phoebe smiled, watching as the snowball fight got underway from the bench on the porch of the house, "Are your sisters any good in a snowball fight? Because lemme tell you, Piper has a great arm, Paige has a great aim from throwing rocks at teacher's cars all through her teens and Pam is basically a pro at everything she does. A lot like her mom."

"Oh, trust me…" Brennan assured her, "They can hold their own…" He kissed the top of her head, pulling her close to warm her up, "So, how much were expecting Piper to everyone that she was actually pregnant?" He laughed, still remembering Piper's opening to her announcement.

Phoebe fidgeted uncomfortably with her fingers, looking down at her lap, "Um… I dunno, you know Piper, she's a great mom. I wouldn't have been that surprised…" She pursed her lips tightly, "But… How much are you expecting me to tell you that I might be pregnant?" She asked quietly, mentally cringing when she felt the arm around her flinch.

"What…?" He breathed, trying to her gaze.

"Look, I don't know for certain… It's just a feeling I have. It's probably nothing, just forget I said anything…" She stuttered slightly, feeling him take her hand in his.

"Pheebs, this is you we're talking about." He let out a small chuckle, "So you are… probably right. Look, we'll get it checked out when we back to the city, okay?" He put his arm back around her shoulders, "It's going to be okay…"

"Alright…"

* * *

Grant cautiously sat down in one of the extremely comfortable armchairs of the Mulwrays. Lorna was sitting in front of the fireplace, reveling in the warmth as she played with the plush cats that she had got for Christmas. She was talking to herself in hushed whispers, obviously playing out some sort of scenario between the two toys as she moved them about.

"You can play too if ya want, Daddy." She said absentmindedly, looking up just in time to every ounce of colour drain from the form elemental's face, "Mommy said dat I can twust ya…"

Grant frowned, "Have you spoken to your Mommy at all today?" He asked. He had been around since the stroke of midnight on Christmas Eve, and at no time had he seen any hint of Emma's presence. Just what was going on?

At this, Lorna let out a small giggle, "Yeah, silly! She speaks in my head." The toddler pressed a finger against her temple, still smiling in an eerily peaceful fashion before going back to playing with toys, "She wants to play too, but she's too faw away…" Lorna said sadly, sticking out her bottom lip and letting out a large sigh.

Grant sat forward, his eyes widening with shock and confusion. "Lorna, what else does your Mommy-?"

"Shh!" Lorna suddenly snarled, raising a finger to her lips, "She's speakin'!" She hissed, her eyes almost glazing over in concentration as she strained to hear whatever she was sensing. Within a few moments, a mournful expression appeared on Lorna's face as she looked towards Grant, "She says you hafta go back now..."

Before he could even respond, Lorna's face was lit up by the sudden fierce cloud of rosy pink orbs that engulfed her father. Whatever outside force that was doing this, it wanted to return Grant to the afterlife quickly. The former elemental just managed to raise his hand and slowly wave goodbye to his daughter, as the orbs suddenly scattered violently in every direction, fading away when they reached a wall of the room.

"Bye bye, Daddy…"

* * *

The new chapter will be up soon!


	6. Two Sides To Every Spirit

**Two Sides To Every Spirit**

Phoebe nervously twisted the strap of her purse until she saw small cracks in the leather. She stared at the pale mint green paint that covered the opposite side of the corridor, busying herself by reading a directory on the wall that told people what was on each floor. Her eyes darted from line to line. Phoebe was confident that if someone was to ask her where the radiology department was, she would be able to tell them, after spending the last ten minutes memorizing the locations of each branch in the hospital. She scrunched up her eyes, sighing and shifting her bangs away from her eyes before running her digits through her long ponytail and burying her face in her hands.

The middle Charmed One was confusing herself with her own behaviour. She had wanted a little girl for as long as she could remember, of course, she loved Connor with every single fiber of her being, but she wanted the connection with a daughter that Brennan had with his son, although he hadn't been around enough lately to nurture it. That was her main fear, that she wouldn't be able to cope with a baby and a young child all by herself, that she would come off as a horrible mother through not being able to look after her children properly. Perhaps that had been the main reason Faith had been so resentful of her when Paige had summoned her and her twin cousins from the future.

Phoebe's expression suddenly brightened in an almost theatrical fashion as she watched Connor come back around the corner with Paige, carrying a plastic cup of smoking coffee in his little hands while his youngest aunt sipped on her own cheap cup of coffee from the vending machine down the hallway. The witchlighter beamed at her sister as she brought the cup away from her mouth, trying to lighten Phoebe's mood, "Hospitals, eh?" She sniggered for no apparent reason, "Always give me the creeps…."

"Thank you, pumpkin." Phoebe smiled at Connor as he handed her the coffee, grinning up at his mother before clambering into the seat next to her. The middle Charmed One shot a sympathetic look at her younger sister, "I'm sorry, honey. I know you don't like hospitals, but Piper's way too engrossed with restaurant stuff to notice anything else around here, and Brennan…"

Paige waved her hand casually as she sat down, blasting air out of her mouth and making a hissing sound, "Don't worry about it. I can stand this place for an hour for a cause as important as this. I'll actually be surprised if you're not… you know…." She shot a glance at Connor, who was too busy to notice what the two witches were talking, "Because, I've sorta been doing a little math with the age that Faith gave us when she came back from the future, and you and Brennan really should have been kicking it up a notch long before now."

Phoebe's jaw dropped, "Paige! There will be no more talk of said notch kicking within the range of tiny ears!" She hissed, still gaping as she gestured towards Connor, who looked up at sound of the phrase 'tiny ears' as he knew his mother only said this when she didn't want him to hear something.

"Mommy, why you at da hoptal anyways? You sick or somthin'?" The toddler asked with confusion, still having trouble with pronouncing the word 'hospital'. His face immediately changed to one of worry at the thought of losing another parent.

Phoebe stuttered for a few moments, shooting a heated glare at Paige for sparking the child's attention, "No, Connor. I'm not sick!" She grinned, setting down her cup of coffee on the table at her side of her chair, lifting her son onto her lap. "The doctor just wants to make sure I'm alright! It's like all those times I take you to the doctor and he puts a Popsicle stick on our tongue. He's just making sure I'm healthy!"

"So… you ain't leavin'?"

She frowned, unbeknownst to herself bringing Connor closer to her chest, putting her arms around him more, "No, of course not. I'm not about to leave my best boy!" She smiled, tapping him delicately on the nose, "Why would you think I'm going to leave?"

At this, the toddler looked down at his lap sadly, fidgeting with his fingers before starting to mumble a response, "Da hoptal took Daddy away…."

"Oh, honey…" She stroked his messy hair lovingly, planting a kiss on the side of his head, "I promise you, I am not going anywhere. When the doctor calls my name, I'm gonna go into that room, and come out again within ten minutes. Okay?" Phoebe gently turned his head, forcing eye contact.

He nodded sharply, frowning with determination, "Kay!"

The door to the doctor's office opened and a dirty blonde woman in her mid thirties stepped out. She looked around the waiting room, straightening her white coat as she did before glancing down at the file in her hand, "Phoebe Mulwray?" The doctor called out calmly and relatively quietly. The woman smiled at Phoebe when she timidly raised her hand, "Come on through…"

* * *

Shalimar knelt down and inhaled the heavenly aroma coming from the patch of light purple tulips in front of her. She brushed the rough wooden floor with her slender fingers, finding it amazing that, even in a slum like his, one of the mutants at the orphanage had still managed to make such beautiful flowers grow here, but that was to be expected of an elemental botanical. Taking the pitcher of water that she brought, the feral gently poured the cool liquid onto the soil, smiling when the earth seemed to absorb it right away. Shalimar hoped that it was the flowers thirst that made the water disappear so quickly, and not the searing heat from the sun evaporating it instantly.

She stood up, putting one hand on her hip and the other above her eyes to look through the gaping hole in the church roof. Shalimar found it hard to believe that the temperature could drop so violently at night when she saw children suffering of heat stroke in the day. The holy building was really just a wreck now. The roof had completely deteriorated, only leaving rafters and large oak beams to show where the ceiling was once been. The interior was in a similar state, pews now shattered with moss devouring them while weeds had begun to grow through the wooden floor, cracking it and destroying the floorboards, but still Shalimar found peace in this ruin.

Her ears twitched at the sound of running feet, before she knew it, half a dozen children had snaked in through the many holes in the walls, some even just run in through the side where there was no wall at all, running to the feral with grins on their faces. All of the kids had dark skin, after living under the intense sunlight for so long and having to work outside most of the time just to live, but all that changed once they were took in by the orphanage.

It made Shalimar sick to think that so many people just abandoned their children just because they had abilities, especially when it had been their trust in Genomex that had poisoned their child's life. After all, Shalimar knew too well about the limited life span of her kind, the powers were not the only burden. They beamed up at her, making the feral's heart melt, this had been one of the reasons she had decided to set down roots here, so she could help out those in need and still be in her element.

"Shallie!" A small girl, no older than five with pigtails cooed, hugging Shalimar's leg, "We're really hot! Can you take us down to the river for a swim?" She asked, giving the blonde her best puppy dog eyes.

She grinned in response, "Sure, as long as Izzy says it's okay, then we'll go and have a cool down. Go check with her then get your swimming gear, I'll be back in a minute, okay?"

Izzy was the one who had started the mutant orphanage in the first place. They had met when Shalimar had helped one of the boys that had got lost in the woods, she had kept him safe and guided him back to his home, when Izzy had mistaken the feral for an intruder and had attacked. She was a molecular regenerative, which meant she could heal herself and others, but she could take life just as fast as she gave it, drawing on someone's life force killing them. Luckily, Shalimar had managed to dodge her 'hands of death' and they sorted out the misunderstanding.

"Mind if I come for a swim too?" A voice said.

Shalimar had been so distracted with the children that she hadn't heard the footsteps of the approaching stranger. She turned around, seeing that he was entering to the side of the church with no wall. Her eyes were immediately drawn to the glimmer on his forearm; she narrowed her eyes, trying to get a better look of whatever it was. Shalimar's immediate thought was that it was some sort of weapon, her suspicions were confirmed when the gleam seemed to be a blade.

"Um… You guys, why don't you go back and tell Izzy we've got company." The blonde mutant suggested, knowing that Izzy would translate 'company' into 'trouble' and hopefully get the children to safety. Five of them nodded their heads and began to run out the church, ducking and weaving into the small crevices that allowed them an exit, but one boy, who was older than the rest, stood his ground.

"Shal, I can help." He argued, his eyes flashing a deep dark brown colour, signifying his feral canine abilities. Even though he was years younger, the feline in Shalimar was scared every time he flashed his eyes.

"Alexander." She said firmly, "Go back and tell Izzy, that's the best thing you can do for me right now. I'll need you to protect the others if something goes wrong, okay?" Shalimar hoped that being entrusted with the responsibility of protection would be enough for the child to flee. Thankfully, she got her wish, as Alexander bolted for the large oak doors that were hanging off their hinges.

"They didn't leave on my account, did they?" The stranger asked with a far too creepy grin for the feral's liking. She eyes darted up and down his body, seeing that he was dressed fairly normally, except that his t-shirt, jeans, and leather jacket were all black. Black? Wearing that colour in this sun was just asking to pass out, yet there didn't seem to be a bead of sweat on the man, nor could Shalimar smell perspiration on him in the slightest.

"Who are you and what you do want?" She snapped, taking a territorial stance and cursing the sarong she wore, albeit it was tied tightly around her waist and flowed down the back of legs, but it would still make fighting difficult if it came to that.

The man laughed and shook his bald head, "You must be the feisty one that the people in the village at the bottom of the hill told me about. I mean, around these parts, you're dressed pretty uniquely to be a local." He chuckled.

Shalimar frowned and look down at her clothing, it consisting of a white bikini top and denim hot pants. Now that she thought, she probably did stick out like a sore thumb when she went down to the village for supplies, as most of the women were usually dressed very frumpy clothes and girls her age were scarce in the town.

"The town talks about us?" Shalimar narrowed her eyes at the man, still trying to figure out of he was an enemy.

"I believe they called you 'one of the women who lives with the freaks'," He relayed, making Shalimar clench her fists in anger. If this guy didn't stop dodging her questions, she would hit him, friend or enemy. "But no matter how much you've moved around, I've found you, feral," He growled, his face twisting into one of malicious pleasure.

Without any warning, he ran at Shalimar with superhuman speed, slashing the air wildly with the weapon attached to his left arm. The blonde, even with her enhanced reflexes, barely managed to bend backwards to avoid the blade. Shalimar bent all the way back so she was standing on hands and feet, before throwing her legs at the man's chest, kicking him with ferocious power and throwing him into the air. Shalimar did a back flip from her position to get back to her feet. She expected to see the attacker, lying stunned on the cracked wooden floor, but was caught off guard when he appeared right in front of her.

"Nice move. No wonder you've earned the title of Genomex's most powerful feral." He grinned at her, obviously taking great pleasure in her astonishment that he had managed to recover so quickly from her attack.

Releasing a primal growl from her throat, Shalimar glared at him with threatening yellow eyes before releasing a slew of punches at his upper body. Stomach, chest, nose, neck, she continued her onslaught, her victim taking every punch as it came, moving in the direction it sent him in. She bared her teeth, before throwing herself up into the air and spinning her left leg up into his face. Her heel connected with his jaw, a bone chilling crack tore through the air, and when Shalimar landed back on her feet, the bald man's head was askew, with one large bone jutting out in his neck. She waited for him to topple, expecting the fight to be over, until he grinned at her, his head moving back into place along with the bone.

"That's not possible…!" The feral breathed, now looking into his grey toneless eyes with an expression of terror. Just what was she up against?

He shook a little and smirked at her, "Perfect. I've been looking for a girl with a little extra kick." He turned his neck, making it crack before beginning to walk towards her.

Not sure what else try, Shalimar ran towards a nearby wooden pillar, running at it with amazing speed before grabbing hold and spinning around it, throwing out her legs and attempting to hit the man square in the face. She wasn't even sure how he did it, but he somehow caught her calves and spun her around like an Olympian hammer thrower, making her collide with the pillar she had just used and sending her crashing right through it, landing to the floor with a cuts and scrapes all over her exposed flesh.

"Is this all you have to offer, Shalimar?" He taunted, picking her up by the throat and watching her squirm. "Perhaps the rest of Mutant X will be more of a challenge to me!" Her eyes widened at the thought of her former teammates in danger, all because she couldn't defeat an enemy.

He shook his head in disgust before hurling her towards the back wall like a weightless rag doll. She zipped past the flower bed of tulips, making the petals fly up into the air from the velocity she was traveling in, before crashing through the brittle wooden wall and landing in the sandy dirt outside.

Shalimar wasn't sure how long she lay there, seconds, minutes, maybe hours. Lilac petals were now floating in the air, coming out of the hole her attacker had created with her body. As she lay there, beaten, bruised, and bleeding, she followed one tulip petal as it passed her eyes, before following another, after the first had fled from her sight. The feral watched the sun travel across the sky, closing her eyes when it came into them directly. The last thing Shalimar saw was the brightness of the sun and a flurry of light purple petals passing by, before she blacked out.

* * *

Piper couldn't keep the childish grin off her face as she entered the establishment. She eyes dazzled with excitement as she turned to the left at the door, holding her arms out to the front as if she was showing off something, "I can see it now! A tastefully lit area where people can wait for a table, perhaps get a drink or two to loosen them up… And a smartly dressed waiter or waitress standing at a podium, waiting to take reservations and show people to their table. Can't you see it, Leo?"

Leo cringed slightly, shoving his hands into his pockets and looking around the large expanse of emptiness, "Honestly? All I see is an empty building." His eyes widened with fear when Piper's expression grew dark towards him, "But then again, I have absolutely no imagination whatsoever, so…" He said nervously, flashing a toothy grin in her direction and softening her look.

The eldest Charmed One raised an eyebrow at him, walking towards her husband and putting her arms around his neck, "You're lucky you're handsome…" She grinned cheekily, planting a quick kiss on his lips before turning back to survey the large space before her. "I can't wait until all the paperwork is finalized and I can-," She cut herself off as she turned back around, seeing Leo's face contort into one of confusion and concentration. "What is it? What's wrong?"

"I dunno… But I'm getting some sort of subconscious call from someone… It's full of desperation and panic…" He replied, shooting a perplexed glance towards his wife as she listened to his description, "I think whoever the person is, they're dying…"

Piper's jaw dropped with shock before her brow furrowed in anger, "Then what the hell are you doing just standing there when this person is losing their life? Orb, for God's sake!" She urged, making wild gestures with her hands as if to get him to move away from her. He nodded grimly in response, before his body began to glow with a swathe of blue and white lights that peacefully enveloped the Elder and carried him through the ceiling to where the call was the strongest.

The eldest Charmed One took in a deep breath, smiling as she spun on her heel and let out an excited squeal in the company of herself, laughing slightly afterwards at her own giddiness before composing her attitude and laying her hands on her hips, sighing longingly. Her celebration was interrupted by the sound of footsteps coming from the entrance; Piper frowned as she turned her head, immediately regarding the stranger with an air of suspicion just from what he was wearing.

The man was dressed from head to toe in black. His entire ensemble brought the wrong kind of attention to himself, but it seemed to Piper that he liked it that way. Her eyes shifted to his arm when a shaft of light from the door caught a glimmer around the man's hand. Piper began to flex her fingers subconsciously, her expression darkening at the thought of a concealed weapon.

"Who are you?" She said with a dark monotonous tone, her eyes narrowed as she stared into his grey eyes, which seemed to dance with excitement at this very moment.

He merely grinned and raised his right arm, causing his sleeve to fall down slightly and reveal a long, sharp, silver blade that was attached to his arm with some sort of cage that wrapped itself around the limb, "Now, can we just skip the pleasantries and get to me taking my vengeance?" He smirked.

That was all she needed to hear. Piper scrunched up her face, bearing her teeth in the process and throwing out her hands in an angry gesture. She was expecting for the man to blow up, or at least be thrown against the wall by the resulting explosion, but she saw no visible damage, or even a visible effect on the man.

He scrunched up his face, shivering slightly and shaking his head a little as if he had felt an unpleasant sensation. After he seemed to have shaken it off, his smirk turned into a malicious grin at Piper's expression, "I really hate it when someone tries to blow me up, although there is a bright side." He raised both his hands, giving the witch a small patronizing frown, "What was that you did with your hands? This?"

Piper didn't even see what he did with his hands, as a powerful explosion struck her chest, the sparks from the fierce blast going in her eyes and causing them to sting. She was thrown into the air, flying across the room before landing roughly on the bare floor and holding her left arm in pain while blinking furiously, as her sight had been temporarily impaired from the sparks of the blast.

"Leo!" She screamed, continuing to blink as her sight started to return, her heart began to race when as she saw a large black blur stand over her. The eldest Charmed One cringed at his laugh, "Le-!" Piper was cut off by a large gloved hand closing around her neck, cutting off her air supply as she was lifted to her feet.

"Rather interesting power you've got there… I've never seen it from an earth elemental before. Your abilities must have expanded during our slumber. This should make fighting the other three rather fun, maybe I should-," He stopped mid-sentence to groan in pain from a blue flash that Piper saw over his shoulder.

"Put her down. Now." Annabelle growled lowly, lowering her arm from its firing position and keeping her harsh brown eyes on her enemy like a hawk, before subtly conjuring another energy ball in the hand that was behind her back.

The man grinned at her, dropping Piper carelessly to the floor before turning around completely to face her, "Thanks for the power boost…" He said smoothly, raising his arm and holding out his hand expectantly until a neon blue energy ball appeared in his hand, buzzing and crackling from sheer power. Without any warning, he merely turned his wrist slightly towards Annabelle, causing the projectile to hurtle towards her stomach, only to be thwarted by the energy ball that she had conjured behind her back. Both of the spheres collided with one another, resulting in a piercing shockwave that threw both combatants to the ground, along with shattering all of the temporary glass in the building.

Ignoring the small pain in her tailbone, Annabelle threw herself back to her feet by pushing hard against the floor with her hands as she raised her arms above her head. She smiled, seeing that the man hadn't recovered as quickly as her, "Piper! Freeze him so we can get the hell out of here!"" She urged to her friend, who was holding to her injured arm tightly, afraid to use any of her powers in case they were absorbed.

"But if I do that, he'll-,"

"We don't have a choice. Do it!" Annabelle urged with wide eyes, gritting her teeth as she hurled another energy ball towards the being. The projectile collided fiercely with his chest, throwing him back to the ground and only causing him to hit the floor with an even bigger temper than he had had before. "Hurry!"

Cringing as she did, Piper threw out her hands in a weary fashion, her eyes widening when her power only succeeded to slow the man down to the snails pace. The witch could only see that it was beginning to ware off, as his movements were starting to get faster and faster. "Let's move. Now!" She spat, grabbing Annabelle's hand as soon as she reached her and allowing the two of them to vanish in a swirl of spinning molecules.

* * *

Shalimar lay on the couch in the sunroom, a powerful golden glow washed over her as Leo attempted to heal the violent welts and patches of dark purple skin that covered her extremely exposed body. The elder bit his lip as his hands began to shake. He had never had to use his powers for such a long time on a person. Relief began to show on his face as the cuts began to close up, the blood seeping from them reversing its flow and returning to its host, and the large swollen bruises started to slowly fade away and vanish, leaving only the feral's bronzed skin.

"I'm next." Piper snapped as she walked into the room from the kitchen, gently shrugging off her jacket as she did, throwing it over the back of the wicker chair and moving her left arm around with certain stiffness, "I think he dislocated it or anything… That bastard." She scowled to herself. "Hey, how'd you know to come and bail me outta there?" She asked Annabelle as the blonde sat down in the opposite wicker chair. "AH! Ow! Oh… That's better." The eldest Charmed One gasped, smiling as she popped her arm back into place.

"It was the Elders. They knew that Leo was too busy with this…" She waved her arm casually at Leo, who had now broken into a sweat from the exertion of using his powers for so long, "… And that he wouldn't be able to come help you, so they jingled in my ear until I gave up and went looking for you."

Piper raised her eyebrows at this, "Wow, I never thought I would be able to put the words 'helpful' and 'Elders' in the same sentence, but go figure. How did they jingle you anyway? Are you within their range or something? Paige!" She suddenly bellowed into the air, before finally taking notice of the woman that was currently fighting for her life on the sofa, "Oh my God… Shalimar?"

"You know her?" Annabelle asked with a shocked frown, glad that Piper seemed to have forgotten about her question, "Well, wherever she's come from, it certainly hasn't been anywhere near here, as I don't know anyone who would dress like that this time of year." She stated.

Before anyone else could get a word in, a cloud of bright orbs began to form in the doorway to the sunroom before completely vanishing as they formed the shapes of Paige, Phoebe and Connor. The three of them stood on the brink of the room, Phoebe with a pale complexion, as if something had shook her to the core. Piper immediately noticed the state of her younger sister, but didn't have time to analyze her, as the middle Charmed One turned on her heel and walked back into the living room with her son.

"What's up with her?" Piper asked her youngest sibling quietly, taking a quick glance at Phoebe from her seat to make sure she wasn't watching them talk about her.

Paige looked over her shoulder before opening her mouth, beginning to answer, then decided against it, "You know, it's probably something she should tell you. She's still a little numb." The witchlighter rolled her eyes and sighed, "Actually, I don't really know why she's so upset. I mean, it is good news!" Her attention was drawn to Shalimar as she began to awaken. "What the hell happened to her?"

"We'll find out when she actually comes to. Listen…" Piper stood up, gently taking Paige by the elbow and leading her into the dining room, "… Could you maybe tell Aidan to get his butt over here? I sorta want to talk to him about something." She asked timidly, making sure that no one was listening in now and again.

"Uh… Yeah, he goes out of his mind with boredom when the kids are at preschool and I'm at work. So I'm sure he'll jump at the chance to get out of the… Aw, crap! Work! What time is it?" She grabbed Piper's wrist, twisting it rather roughly so she could look at the face.

"Okay, ow!"

Paige shot an apologetic look at her sister, "Sorry…" She bit her lip, cringing slightly at the thought of losing her job before taking a sigh of relief, "Okay… eleven fifteen. I still have around forty five minutes." She caught Piper's bemused expression, "I took the morning off to go with Pheebs to the hospital… Oh! Right! Aidan! I'm on it!" The witchlighter made a hurried mock salute, before vanishing in a swirl of orbs that accidentally took Piper's watch along with her.

"For Gods sake…" The eldest Charmed One sighed to herself, making her way back to the seating in the sunroom, "You'd think after years of orbing all over Creation, that she'd-," The witch was cut off by a loud and sharp gasp of breath as Shalimar suddenly sat bolt up right on the wicker sofa, taking in deep breaths. "Well, it's about time!"

"I'm just gonna sit here for a little bit…" Leo managed to breathe out, stumbling slightly from the position on his knees before wrenching himself to his feet and collapsing into the wicker chair that his wife had inhabited moments ago. Piper sat down on the arm of the chair, stroking her husband's hair as she began to talk.

"Shal? Are you okay?" The eldest Halliwell asked, giving the feral a sympathetic look as she slowly turned on the couch and swung her legs over the edge, her feet landing on the floor with a thud.

Shalimar ran a hand through her curly blonde locks, blinking a few times as she tried to sort out her memories, "Yeah, I think so…" She rubbed the back of her neck loosely before her eyes widened in horror, "Oh my God! All the children! What if he got to them? You need to orb me back now!" She was standing in a flash, tugging on Leo's sleeve.

"What are you talking about? What children?" Piper asked calmly before loosing her cool, "Just where did Leo find you dying?"

The blonde let out a frustrated grunt, flopping back onto the sofa, "I was in Australia… In a really far out little place, almost completely on its own geographically, away from all the major cities… The perfect place for a mutant orphanage…" She mused with a smile, before getting to her feet again, "But I need to go back, if that guy got them, then-,"

"What guy?"

"I don't know!" She snapped, clenching her fists to prevent her from lashing out and breaking something, "I don't know… He was dressed in black, had a blade attached to his arm-,"

"Bald?" Piper questioned, earning a nod from Shalimar, "Yeah, I think we fought the same guy, and for some reason, I don't think he's going after those kids. He's going after something else…"

"Maybe he's coming after you and your sisters' powers." Annabelle offered, shrugging, "Think of the damage that maniac could do with all of your abilities, and he certainly had no trouble fending off our collective strength… He'll probably want all three of you together, to force you to use your powers on him."

"Well, if that's how he takes powers, then he's definitely got two of mine and one of yours. I shouldn't have frozen him when we left, you could have just transported yourself over to me instead of running." Piper argued, standing up and folding her arms as she began to pace, shooting a glare at Annabelle.

"You were three feet away!" The mercenary argued back, "It would have taken longer if I had transported. Besides, witches don't freeze, so that power won't exactly help him in a fight with you." She got to her feet, frowning darkly before looking at Shalimar, "Why don't you come with me to the book and see if this guy is in it? I'm sure we'll find him quicker if there are two people that have seen him looking…"

"Uh… Sure." Shalimar cautiously replied, looking between Piper and Annabelle for a few seconds before rising to her feet, thankful for the escape from the tension that seemed to have instantly appeared between the two women.

Leo let out a sigh as he sat forward, taking a quick glace at the two women who were now ascending the stairs, before standing up and facing his wife, who still wore a stony resolve, "Listen, I'm gonna go back to where I found Shalimar and make sure these kids she was talking about are alright." He gave her a quick peck on the cheek, smiling, "Play nice." He warned, before vanishing in a column of blue and white lights that carried him through the ceiling.

It was only now Piper was alerted by the sound footsteps behind her. "Whoa, I'm sorta glad I held back. Things got a little ugly there." Aidan commented, glancing up the stairs for a brief second before raising his eyebrows at Piper, "So, Paige said you wanted to talk to me about something? I gotta tell you though; I'm not too sure what it could be about."

"Actually, it's about elementals. Let's go into the kitchen." She ordered, walking briskly past him with her arms still folded, her heels clomping angrily off the wooden floorboards as she walked.

* * *

Phoebe sat in the attic, her legs curled up underneath her as she dug her nails into one the tattered old cushions that littered the room. She picked at the stitching on the side, grimacing a little when the thread came loose and the foam interior was exposed to her vision. Piper was going to kill her.

Shalimar looked up from the Book of Shadows, frowning at the middle Charmed One's distant look. She warily began to approach her friend, with each step unraveling what this was all really about, "So… Annabelle's gone down to the Underworld to see if there's any news on this demon…" She opened with, taking a seat next to Phoebe on the sofa, "It was probably a good idea to take Connor back to preschool, this place could get a little dangerous… But why do I think that we're going to have to take precautions for you as well?" She questioned with a half smile, shooting a knowing glance at Phoebe's stomach.

The feral got an eye roll in return as the middle Charmed One finally broke her silence, "My God, was I the only one who _didn't_ know for sure? Was it just some big world secret? Or did you all think that because I had my daughter come back from the future, that I would automatically have a daughter? Well, sometimes things don't work out like that. Although in this case, they do…"

"Pheebs, why are you so… negative about this? I mean, you've wanted a little girl for the longest time, and it looks like you're gonna one, unless there's some big change in destiny that means Connor's getting a little brother." Shalimar smirked when she saw Phoebe suppress a smile at her comment, "So what gives?"

Phoebe didn't respond for a few seconds, going back to picking at the cushion before replying, "Because this isn't how it was supposed to all work out. Brennan was supposed to be right by my side, offering words of encouragement and he was supposed to be here to take care of Connor more often…" She ran a hand through her hair, "I'm basically in this alone. I mean, what happens when I'm too big to move around a lot? Connor still needs to be taken to preschool, to the park… Groceries would need to be bought; housework would need to be done… Just all these things that I'm supposed to have help with, and I won't. And I can hardly ask Connor to go to the store, can I?"

Shalimar let out a chuckle, taking Phoebe's hand, "No, I guess you can't. But Pheebs, you are anything but alone in this. You are surrounded by one of the tightest family units that I have ever seen! And if they don't help you – which is very unlikely – then I'll be here, quick as a flash, and so will Lexa. I'm sure she'll jump at the chance to spend some time with her godson if you wanted to."

The middle Charmed One let a ghost of a smile play on her lips, "I never really thought of it like that…" She looked up at Shalimar; her grip on the feral's hand tightening slightly with fear, "Just… Promise me that I'm not going to be alone in this."

"I promise." The blonde replied firmly, leaning over a little so she could wrap her arms around Phoebe's neck, pulling her into a loving hug and stroking her hair in a motherly fashion.

The promise however, hadn't helped soothed Phoebes nerves. She didn't know what it was, but something just wasn't right about this pregnancy. She had tried to be happy, she had tried to be positive, all the things that a pregnant woman should be feeling, and even with this promise of help when she needed it, she wasn't at peace. Something just didn't feel right, something deep inside her told the middle Charmed One that she was in for a wild ride with this one.

And not in a good way.

* * *

"Um… Aidan? Are you sure I'm allowed to be in here? I mean, the last two times were under special circumstances, and I'm no elemental." Piper warned her brother in law timidly as they stepped out the calm portal and onto the edge of the Elemental Chamber. The heavenly tones of the Angel's Melody reached her ears within her first step into the enchanted cavern, the walls glowed with the raw magical power that was kept within these boundaries, almost bursting with energy that wanted to be set free and dance upon the world.

"Well, from what you tell me, this guy thinks you're an elemental, and he went after you for that reason, so I'm thinking that he'll come after me, Skye and Maxwell. Not only are you safe here, but I've brought you here for another reason." Without another word, he shoved his hand into his pocket, before pulling it back out and showing something to Piper made her gasp, "Skye and Max gave me these before they went to their respective hiding places." He pointed to the minuscule shards of amethyst and ruby in his palm, "And I've been keeping Lorna's, hoping to give it to her when she was older," He showed her the small grain of topaz that sat in his hand, along with the other two gems. "And… This is mine." He shoved his hand into another pocket, revealing a small part of a sapphire in his hand.

"Beautiful…" Piper whispered, amazed at how much they sparkled underneath the natural glow coming from the bewitched walls. Shafts of red, purple, gold, and blue light struck across her face, making it look as if she was making a multicoloured mask, "What are they for?" She asked with mounting curiosity, not daring to touch something so mysterious.

Aidan turned around and walked to the edge of the large stone plateau that they were standing on, holding his clenched fist, "They're for summoning the spirit elemental known as Satus." He explained, biting his lip in the process, "I've never done this by the way, I've only ever read about it a journal that was written by an air elemental centuries ago. You find all sorts of stuff in the Atlantian archives… Anyway, it didn't end very well for him; the last journal entry is by his wife, saying that all that was left of her husband wouldn't fill out a ring box."

Piper stood behind him, shock white, with her mouth wide open, "Okay, and you choose to tell me this when you're three seconds away from not being to fill out a ring box? Maybe we shouldn't do this." She said with a slight quiver in her voice, beginning to turn back to the portal.

"No, I think we should be okay. The guy who was writing the journal had summoned the spirit elemental so get more power, so he would be the one that ruled over the rest of the comrades. What he didn't know was that that position can only be filled by the earth elemental, as whoever it is provides balance, clarity and a sense of peace to the group…" He turned back to Piper, smiling slightly, "Are you ready?"

With a sigh, the eldest Charmed One made her way to his side, standing at the edge of the plateau, "You are way too excited about this, considering we could be a pile of ash in mere moments…" There were a few moments of silence as Aidan concentrated. He was about to release the gems when Piper grabbed his fist, stopping him, "Wait! Just so I'm surprised and end up blurting out something inappropriate, what does Satus look like?"

"No one knows." The water elemental replied simply, shrugging, "As the title suggests, the being is, well, spiritual. It doesn't have one absolute form. Although it will come to us in a physical form if it's willing to actually to talk to us, it'll be nothing specific, just a random form…" He noticed her look of fear, "Look, don't worry, I'm sure its form won't be too shocking… I hope…" He whispered to himself lowly, before finally dropping the four gems into the smooth dark water below.

As soon as the gems hit the water's surface, everything fell silent. The usually calming Angel's Melody was replaced by a dark and foreboding silence. Piper was positive that you would be able to drop a pin on the other side of the chamber, and you would be able to hear it from where she was standing all too clearly. The witch stood in complete silence, afraid of what would happen if she did break the quiet. She surveyed the entire cavern with a wide eyed look, before letting out a shrill yelp of surprise when a tall column of intensely bright white light blasted from the dark water, flying towards the ceiling and connecting with the top of the chamber, sending an earth shattering rumble through the room. She felt Aidan's hand around her elbow, pulling her back from the edge so she wouldn't fall in from her surprise. Piper proceeded to raise her arm around her eyes, until she felt that the light was at a bearable level for sight, but she wasn't prepared for what she saw next.

A young boy with messy blonde hair stood in front of her. He was dressed in a cloak that covered him completely from his shoulders down to his ankles, where his bare feet were in loose uncomfortable looking black sandals. At first, Piper had thought she was looking at Wyatt; it took a few seconds for her eyes to come down the exposure to harsh light before she realized this boy was anyone but her son. The inky black points of a sun were tattooed in such a way that it circled one of his milky white eyes, leaving the other side of his face to be obscured by various tribal markings.

Next to him stood a young girl with smooth chocolate skin. She was dressed in the same fashion, in a jet black cloak that covered her body completely, and white sandals that looked like a horrible specimen of footwear. Her black hair was tied back in such a tightly wound weave that long hair flowed down her back, leaving the bright white tattoos on her face to be the only thing that you would be drawn to, apart from the black eyes, which seemed to hold no evil, just a sense of mystery and endlessness. A white crescent moon tattoo arched around her left eye; while many small tattoos of six pointed stars dotted the other side of the side of her face.

"Why have you summoned me?" The boy asked Aidan, his blank eyes narrowing towards the water elemental and his mouth was open just enough that Piper could see his clenched teeth. He was truly angry, "Have you any knowledge as to what happened to the last fool that invoked the power of Quad to bring me from my realm outside time and space?" Aidan bowed his head respectfully, Piper was about to scoff, before she remember the story he had told her he summoned the spirit elemental, and decided to bow her head, "You and your fellow elementals are expendable, easily replaced within the Grand Design. Remember this before your tongue races away from your mind." The boy warned, his voice containing a hint of sympathy and compassion, but also harshness and mercilessness, "You may speak, water elemental."

Aidan raised his head, gulping and taking a deep breath before opening his mouth, "Thank you, Satus… And I assure you I haven't brought you here to take advantage of your eternal strength, only to inquire on a certain matter, that which I'm sure you shall be able to answer with your endless knowledge that stretches through time itself…"

"If I choose to answer." The young girl replied, smirking at the fear her and her counterpart's presence seemed to cause. Piper guessed that, although these two children were the same immortal entity, each child represented the light and darkness within every person's soul, "Continue, water elemental, what issue is it that you seek knowledge on? Could it be the questionable shift in destiny for the woman that stands at your side?"

Piper's eyes widened at this, before her brow furrowed in anger, "Hey! This woman has a name, you know. And so does he!" She snapped, gesturing towards Aidan who, as soon as they made eye contact, gave her a look that said 'ring box' which made her shift uncomfortably, before offering a weak smile, "… Sorry… I guess that's what you meant with the whole 'tongue racing away from my mind' thing, huh?"

"Bite your tongue!" The young girl hissed, a flash of anger passing over her dark eyes for a brief moment, "It is because of you that this abomination has once again been released upon the world." She sneered, giving Piper a condescending look, filled with disgust, "Witches should learn that they are not the ones in control when it comes to magic. You are mere agents, thinking that since you hold a sliver of magical power, you deserve respect from the rest of the community, when really you and your sisters are just foolish children with a slight increase of power, making yourselves out to be the most powerful force in the universe."

"We are hardly kids." Piper stated defiantly, falling out of her respectful stance and folding her arms, cocking her eyebrow in the process, "And we don't act as if we're all high and mighty. We know our boundaries and hardly ever cross them."

"Oh, really?" The blonde boy asked with a smirk, raising an eyebrow, "If you hadn't had the blind and moronic determination to bring forth a late elemental, then you wouldn't be standing here, questioning your own destiny. Your actions are why you seem to have a new rush of power, and why there is a destructive force that has once again been unleashed…"

Piper narrowed her eyes, thinking that it had been stupid for Satus to take the form of two children, when no adult would tolerate a child talking to them in the manner these two were talking to them in now, "So, wait… Are you saying that because I summoned Grant I've somehow become the earth elemental _and_ released that bald guy that takes powers? How does that work?"

"The power that you released goes by the name of Diam. He was sealed away eons ago by the elementals that came before you, an agent of the empty, one that doesn't differentiate between the two moral sides… It exists only to devour." The blonde looked towards his counterpart as a single for her to continue.

"However, it is nothing compared to what it exists to serve, which is something even fiercer that anything either of you have ever seen or will ever see… It's something that was thought to have been dealt with a long time ago, when good and evil had to unite against its power and send it the outer reaches of the magical world, always under the watchful eye of those in power." The girl finished, surveying Piper for a moment before looking back towards the blonde boy.

"When you summoned a past elemental from the afterlife, you brought him into being by calling to him through his powers. Powers that had transferred through his blood to his offspring." He took a brief pause, "The child was never meant to have the powers of an elemental, so when her father was summoned, his powers were taken back from her and given to him…"

"… And when he was sent back to the afterlife, there was no need for him to have his powers, so they found a host in the person closest and most qualified." The girl finished for him. "It was these points, when the powers were transferred, that the elemental seal was shattered, allowing Diam to escape from his prison in those brief seconds where the power was broken."

The boy looked into Piper's eyes, cocking his head, "We can reverse the flow, return the powers to the child and return you to your singular status as a Charmed One."

It was the first time the witch had looked happy since they had arrived in the chamber, only for a look of sadness to take it away, "No… I can't give them up…" She looked around, suppressing a smirk when she saw the smallest look surprise on the two faces of the spirit elemental, "This Diam guy is after elementals, so giving these powers back to Lorna would basically be signing her death warrant, and I promised that I would keep her safe, so…" She took a large sigh, "I'll keep them. Besides, how tough can this guy be?"

The two children shared a grave look, before their eyes began to glow with a fierce golden light, the light only disappearing for a moment when they would blink, "Wait…" The boy whispered, his brow furrowing in thought, "Three of your group are about to learn the hard way just how wrong your statement is…"

* * *

Paige and Shalimar appeared from the bright cloud of orbs that landed in the middle of the building's lobby. They were shortly followed by a river of particles that built up slowly into Annabelle, a fierce look of determination spread across her face as she looked at the thick elevator doors for a second before having a look around the establishment. The entire floor was covered in marble. Eight marble pillars, four on each side, seemed to only be there for show, to match with the dark green marble walls.

"I wonder why he chose to come to a law firm of all places." Paige cringed, taking the cautious first few steps while her hazel eyes darted wildly around the room, fearing what could be lurking behind the thick pillars.

"Probably the same reason he came after me; to make an example, to show that he's top dog and that he can take out a building full of people in a matter of minutes…" Shalimar said with an air of resentment and anger, her pride still wounded from their previous encounter. "I just wish we had got here sooner…" She said sadly, knowing that many people were now dead, all because the scrying crystal hadn't dropped quickly enough.

"Yeah, well, with any luck, we'll be able to avenge all these people and send this bastard to where he belongs." Annabelle growled, looking above the elevator doors to see someone was on their way down, "Okay, Paige, you hang back with the banishment spell. Me and Shalimar will try and hold him off as long as we can so you can get that ritual finished."

"Alright. Good luck…" The witchlighter whispered back, beginning to take out items from the bag on her shoulder and setting them down on the floor, before taking a cross legged position next to them. Paige took a deep breath, lighting three candles in the shape of a triangle, and expertly beginning to throw potion ingredients into a brass ritual urn.

The elevator doors opened, revealing the man that they had altogether fought three times today. Diam stood in the back, his hands casually placed on the bar that ran around the walls of the elevator. "My, my, what a welcoming party! Although it probably would have been better for the people upstairs if you had got here earlier. I'm not saying you would have been able to stop me, you just would have given them a few extra seconds of life…"

"Wow, you really _do_ never get tired of hearing the sound of your own voice, do you?" Shalimar spat, a smirk of confidence managing to cover up her fear of the man that had beaten her to near death once already today, "I hope all those people weren't treated to a speech, unless you like your victims to beg for death before you actually kill them."

Diam grinned boldly, folding his arms and looking past the two blondes that stood in his way, "And what is that little witch doing over there all by her lonesome? Hmm… Three candles for three people… Is she lighting your way to the afterlife?"

"More like paving the way for yours." Annabelle said sassily, raising an eyebrow as if to challenge her opponent to come forward and make the first move of the fight. "Are we going to get this started or not?" She asked rhetorically, shrugging.

He shrugged back, unfolding his arms, "If you insist!" He raised his right arm in a flash, conjuring a sparking energy ball in his palm and hurling it in between the two women closest to him. The projectile whirred past both of their shoulders, singing their skin before making a beeline for Paige's head. Luckily, the youngest Charmed One had sensed an incoming attack, and raised her hand, telekinetically reflecting it off her palm and causing it to spin off in another direction, taking out a chunk of the wall in the process.

"That's my power!" Annabelle barked with fury as she turned to Diam, releasing an energy ball of her own that was coupled with Shalimar leaping into the air at a fantastic speed at her target, kicking him solidly in the chest before removing herself from the path of Annabelle's energy ball, which combusted against the being's torso, leaving only wisp of smoke in its wake.

Still with a smirk on his face, Diam shot his hand out towards Shalimar, grabbing her tightly by the throat and lifting her into the air, "I've thrown you through one wall today, want to go for a second?" He taunted, before a flash of neon blue zipped past his sight, crashing into the marble wall next to the elevator doors and hitting the black clothed man with a rain of marble chunks. Once the dust settled, Diam's face was revealed to be covered in small cuts from the marble, while Shalimar sat on the ground, before scrambling to get away from the man's reach.

"So I guess energy balls have a lot more uses than I first thought!" He said triumphantly, moving towards Annabelle with such speed that even Shalimar was envious of the ability. He clutched the mercenary around the neck, grinning manically, "But I prefer to throw things that have a bit more weight…" He whispered lowly to Annabelle, before throwing out his free arm and hitting Shalimar, who had been running towards him at the time.

The feral was thrown into the air, cutting through it at an incredible rate. She crashed into one of the marble pillars, the substance crumbling against the unbelievable velocity of Shalimar's body. She fell right through the column, many bones shattered on impact with the hard material, before she fell to the ground on the other side, hit by falling chunks of marble that were crumbling off the pillar.

"You're next…" He growled to Annabelle, before turning on his heel and propelling her towards the thick steel doors of the elevator. The fatal damage was almost instant as the blonde flew into the doors, somehow applying enough force to break through the steel and hit off the back wall of the elevator shaft. Annabelle hung for a few seconds after her collision, before hitting the bottom of the elevator shaft, which was luckily already rather close, as they were on the bottom floor.

Diam turned back to Paige, who was rocking back and forth with tears running from her scrunched up eyes as she tried to chant the spell, but her voice kept failing her and would give up half way through a verse, meaning she had to start again. "Don't worry. Dying isn't so bad, and I promise to make it as quick as it was for your friends…"

Paige opened her eyes. She wasn't going to run. If she could do anything from stopping this being getting to his next target, she would do it. It didn't matter if she only lasted a few seconds, she was going to fight. Valiantly, she threw her arm across her chest, telekinetically throwing Diam into the air before hit the ground the skidded along the smooth floor, almost hitting his head off the ruined steel doors which Annabelle had been thrown through moments ago.

"Thanks for that…" He growled, getting back to his feet and flashing her a sick smile before raising his arm at the wall and clenching his fist.

The witchlighter's eyes widened in horror as she watched what he could with her power. A thunderous rumble shook the floor as a large chunk of marble was telekinetically torn from the wall. At first, the heavy substance fought against the separation, before it was ripped away and suspended magically in the air for a few seconds. The last thing Paige saw was the marble flying towards her, then a sharp pain, and then it instantly over.

Everything flashed white, before it all faded to black…


	7. Dark Lights Will Guide You Home, Part I

**Dark Lights Will Guide You Home Part 1**

"Okay…" Piper breathed as she set the final box of Paige's possessions down on the floor in the foyer, "That is the last of everything in the truck." She announced, making her way over to one of the black leather sofas that had been carelessly dumped near the front door, "I'll never know why you didn't hire removal men, I don't even remember how I got roped into helping!" She shot a glare at Paige, who was going through a few boxes, making sure nothing was broken.

Paige smirked at her sister's comment, "Because removal men can't freeze things if they drop them… Although most of the drops were made by you, so maybe you shouldn't have helped after all." She was replied to with a small mint green pillow smacking her in the face, courtesy of Piper, "Hey! You didn't let me finish…" She cleared, "But since you saved all the other drops that weren't made by your clumsy self, I thank you."

"You are very welcome." Piper grinned, sitting back in the sofa and crossing her legs over one another, "So… Now we have all these boxes… Tons of boxes… All needing to be unpacked. Of course, you could rely on everyone pitching in to help set everything up, but only you know where you want everything, so you're basically doing this all by yourself…" The eldest Charmed One casually added, pouting her lips and looking at the ceiling.

Paige smirked, narrowing her eyes at her sibling and putting her hands on her hips, "Hint noted and advice taken." She groaned, turning around and stepping away from all the boxes, shaking her head, "Besides, I can't throw a house warming when the house is just stone cold to start with." She turned to Piper, raising an eyebrow. "You may want to stand up, because that sofa certainly isn't staying there!" She advised, her eyes dazzling with excitement with the thought of what she was about to do after Piper stood up. Taking in a deep breath, Paige threw up her arms towards the boxes, speaking clearly and firmly, "To your places!"

The two witches watched in amazement as various clouds of orbs shot from the boxes, flying over the house and bathing the entire space in a pale blue light. Some floated up through the ceiling, some flew through the walls, and some went to the floor, where they would go to the basement. As Paige had predicted, the sofa that Piper had been sitting on moments ago vanished in a swirl of twinkling lights and reappeared next to the back wall of the living room. Piper had to get used to the odd sensation of when a cloud of orbs would occasionally fly through her, leaving her with a shiver in her spine. It wasn't long before she was looking at a home, not just a house. To her left, the living room was filled with three large leather sofas, the widescreen TV sat in the corner, a large mirror hung above the fireplace, and various photos and keepsakes littered the mantelpiece. To her right, the first thing that caught her attention in the dining room was the large glass table that was in the centre of the room. It seemed to be rather sophisticated; nothing seemed to be out of place. A dark oak dresser held all of Paige's best dinnerware, including a set that her mother had once owned before she died.

"Basement." Paige ordered firmly, making a downward pushing gesture and causing all of the boxes to vanish in a large swathe of orbs that culminated into one large cloud, before heading to the floor and sending the boxes to the basement.

"Wow…" Piper breathed as she walked into living room, settling herself in the leather sofa that sat underneath the front window, "Remind me to bring you along the next time I need to clean the house. I'll need to use you for as long as I have you if you're going to keep pulling stunts like you did with Shal and Annabelle. Going after that demon was a suicide mission."

The witchlighter gave her big sister a roll of her eyes, "Hey! It wasn't our fault that time moved differently where you were. To us, you were gone for hours. People were dying, what were we supposed to do?" She argued, sitting down next to Piper and putting her arm up on the back of the sofa, "Besides, he only got one power out of the whole thing, so it's all good."

"You call bring crushed against a wall by a ton of marble 'all good'?" Piper raised an eyebrow, shrugging her shoulders, "You're all lucky that the spirit elemental decided to intervene and save your stubborn asses. It even revived all the people that the demon killed in its rampage. That, in my mind, is what is all good… Apart from me stealing Lorna's heritage."

"What? That's ridiculous! You were trying to do a nice thing for the little girl that you have looked after as your own for the past two years, crazy elemental laws are to blame, not you. Don't beat yourself up over trying to help a dad get to know his daughter, even though he disappeared before midnight, which I find quite strange." Paige frowned hard for a moment, pondering over the situation before shaking it off, "Anyway, you still coming to my house warming tonight?" She lightly tapped Piper on the thigh, "I can't believe how many people I actually know! Everyone's going to be here!"

Piper suppressed the smirk on her face, "Careful there, sis. You're starting to sound like one of those housewives who lights up at the thought of a dinner party. Who is coming anyway? I'm rather intrigued to find out just how you've managed to maintain a social life since you became a witch."

"I actually don't really know how I've done it. I just get along with everyone at work, meet friends now and again… It seems to work. That and Aidan seems to have been having a social life during unemployment. Some of his old buddies from the fire station are coming tonight; he's hoping he can get a job out of them." Paige smiled at the thought, before her grin vanished, "Wow, I hope they don't think they've just been invited for that…"

"Speaking of husbands, just where have ours gone off to? I do believe they left us with the rest of the unpacking." Piper commented, looking around, "They went out to get supplies, which shouldn't be taking that long. Although they're weighed down by Lorna and the twins do I'll give them a half hour time delay…" She smirked, looking out the window, "Anyway, I guess I better get back to the house, I've got a house warming to get ready for!"

Paige laughed in response as her eldest sister stood up, "Oh God, listen to us, we sound so…" She cringed, scrunching up her eyes in embarrassment at her temporary lapse in memory, "Ugh, what's the word?"

Piper smiled as she responded, "Normal?"

* * *

Emma stood in the darkness, her eyes closed in deep concentration as she attempted to summon. Nothing could be seen around her, apart from a prism of weak blue light that shot down over her from an unknown source. Her deep red hair was tied back into a ponytail that flowed down to her lower back, as her hair had had a chance to grow during her long slumber, leaving her with hair that was longer than Piper's, which the psionic had always been envious of.

Wisps of lilac smoke began to form a figure in front of her, gathering together in a large column before leaving a surprised Annabelle standing in its place. The blonde glared at the redhead across from her, moving a strand of hair away from her face, "You know, Emma, you should stop doing this. What if a demon was to attack Piper's boys and I'm lying on the couch unconscious because you've yanked my spirit away?"

The psionic smirked gleefully in return, "I wouldn't let that happen, mainly because I would sense if a demon was about attack before said demon even made the decision to attack." She answered smugly; folding her arms, "Besides, I'm extremely careful with this process, so don't worry about it." Emma reassured her, smiling.

"Yeah, well, you better be careful. You're a being from the Higher Realm, something tells me that communing with the likes of me is a sure fire way to get your soul obliterated." Annabelle commented warily, folding her arms and staring into the psionic's eyes, "So, I take it you were responsible for Lorna's father's little disappearing act at Christmas?"

Surprisingly, Emma beamed with pride, "Yeah, Lorna sensed I was alive somewhere, so she contacted me. I still don't know how she managed to get through all the walls that separate planes; she's becoming a powerful little psychic." She sighed loudly, fidgeting with her hands, "But there's only so much you can expect from a two year old, and keeping secrets isn't one of them…"

"So you hauled Grant's ass back into the afterlife before he could go tell everyone else that you were having silent conversations with your daughter? Didn't that expose you to certain degree?"

"I'm good at covering my tracks. I managed to stay undetected." Emma assured her firmly, before raising a questioning eyebrow, "Have you?"

Annabelle narrowed her eyes, shaking her head in disbelieve, "You've known me since you were nineteen, and in that space of time, have I ever let you down? I'm keeping an eye on Lorna, just like you asked, although I think she'll be safe without me around tonight. Piper's taking her to Paige's house warming party, she won't come to any harm as long as she's around the Power of Three… What is it?"

Emma's look had turned distant as she frowned, "Nothing, I just got a little chill when you started talking about the house warming… Keep an eye on everyone tonight. Use that little trick I taught you a few years ago." Her eyes suddenly shot back to Annabelle, pursing her lips, "Piper's coming. Looks like this little meeting of the minds is over."

It didn't long for Annabelle to vanish in the way that she had arrived, her form turning into a column of lilac smoke that flew off into the darkness as her spirit was sent back to her body, leaving Emma to chew nervously at her bottom lip before being swept up in a cloud of rose pink lights that carried her back to the Higher Realm.

* * *

Piper looked around, raising her wine glass to her lips and taking a sip of the sparkling fluid. She never realized that Paige was still in contact with so many of her friends. The eldest Charmed One could recognize people from South Bay Social Services from when she would go in to see Paige or to collect her for a demonic emergency. There were people from her youngest sister's current job, along with around ten women and their husbands that Piper didn't recognize. There were also some of Aidan's friends from the fire department, relaxing on the couches and making good use of their rare time off.

"Oh, for the love of God, Pheebs. Would you put that emerald in your purse? I'm sure Paige's friends think we're weird enough already without you adding more fuel to the fire. Why are you rolling the damn thing in your hand anyway?" Piper snapped, frowning at her younger sister, who merely raised her eyebrows.

"Well, I had nothing to do at work today, so I went exploring on the web and came across this website. Apparently, an emerald is the perfect enhancement stone for my powers… I carry all sorts of crystals in my purse for spiritual protection, and I thought I would give this a go. Besides, I'm getting a weird vibe from this house, so the more powerful I am, the quicker I can figure it out." She explained, looking around suspiciously at all the guests with her eyes narrowed.

"Silly me, and there was me thinking that you would actually do work at work…" Piper added snidely, setting her wine glass down on the coffee table and turning a little to face her sister, "And what are you talking about with this vibe? I've been in this house for most of the day and I've felt nothing."

Phoebe gave her a skeptical look, "Of course you haven't. You're not a psionic…" She bit her lip, letting out a groan of annoyance and she continued to roll the gem in her hand, "It was faint when I first came in… But the longer I stay in here, the stronger it gets… It's as if it's in the air or something." She suddenly stood up, taking in a large sigh, "I'm gonna go have a look around the house, see if I can pick up on anything else… That and if I don't find something else other than orange juice to drink, then I'm going to go insane." The middle Charmed one left with a roll of her eyes, heading towards the kitchen.

"Ugh…" Paige groaned as she flopped into the space that Phoebe had occupied moments ago, "Please tell me why I had to have a party? I'm absolutely exhausted…" The witchlighter sighed, running her hands through her hair and widening her eyes, trying to stay awake, "I just want to crawl into bed."

Piper frowned, noticing a thin film of sweat covering her sister's face as she rested on the couch, "Are you okay?" she asked, moving over slightly and placing the back of her hand on Paige's forehead, her frown deepening, "Sweetie, you're burning up." She announced, "Okay, I think it's time to end the party."

Before Paige could answer, Leo walked across to his wife, Wyatt was next to him as he rested his head on his father's side while his younger brother stood at the other side, doing the exact same thing as his eyelids began to droop. Piper surveyed the three people of her immediate family, instantly noticing that something wasn't right. "Honey, I'm gonna take the boys home. I think they've got the flu or something. They're not looking so hot." Leo announced.

"Uh… You're not looking too good yourself." Piper shot back, standing up and pressing her hand against Leo's forehead in the same fashion she had done to Paige. "Well, you're not as bad as her… Okay, go on home, I'll catch up after me and Phoebe get the proud hostess over there into bed…" She glanced at Paige, who, to be honest, looked half dead.

Just as Leo headed for kitchen, going for the back door so he could orb out and get home quickly within the seclusion of Paige's back yard, Aidan made his way through the crowd of guests, Melinda held firmly in his arms as she held on around his neck, burying her face in his shoulder, "Uh… Paige? Both the girls have fevers and my cooling touch isn't working. What's going on?"

"Why didn't you bring Emma down too if she's sick?" Paige managed to breathe out, frowning at her husband through a curtain of dark hair as her locks fell over her face.

"Because she didn't seem to have it as bad as Melinda, and she was too stubborn to come down in front of all the guests in her pajamas. Where she gets that trait baffles me…" He said with a smirk. He moved to hand his daughter over to Paige, before Piper stepped in his way.

"No, give her to me. The last thing we need is these two sharing germs," The eldest Charmed One ordered, holding out her arms and taking her niece from Aidan, "Go and make sure Emma is okay." Piper raised a hand to Melinda's forehead. She was easily the worst out of all the people that she had seen sick tonight. She had a high fever, which explained why the toddler was slipping in and out of unconscious, "What the hell is going on?"

* * *

"Lorny, come on!" Connor argued, frowning at the little redhead as she sat on the kitchen floor, her hands and ear firmly pressed against the wall. "We're missin' all da fun out dere!" He pointed out, letting out an exaggerated sigh of annoyance as she continued to ignore him. Connor was about to resort to pulling Lorna to her feet, when the clomping of heels caught his attention, "Mommy, get Lorny off da floor!"

Phoebe looked down, seeing that her foster niece was indeed on the floor. Her eyes were closed in deep concentration as it seemed she strained to hear something within the wall, "Um… Connor… Why don't you go see what the twins are up to? I'll talk to Lorna." She assured him, lovingly ruffling his hair as he passed her on his way out.

"I heaw you…" Lorna whispered melodically, "Big meanie…" She hissed, scowling deeply before lighting hitting her fist off the wall.

Timidly, Phoebe knelt down, sitting on the floor and moving towards Lorna, still rolling the emerald in her hand as she did. Whatever she sensed was becoming stronger here; as if it had manifested itself slightly ward off Lorna's psionic senses. "Lorny… Do you sense it too?"

"Phoebe?"

The middle Charmed jumped in surprise, suddenly realizing that she must look stupid sitting on the kitchen floor. She looked up, her eyes widening from who she saw looking down at her with a questioning stare. He looked taller from when she had last seen her, albeit she was sitting on the floor, but he still seemed different. Even more handsome, this made Phoebe mentally cringe, "Isaac…? Um… Hi... What are you doing here?"

"Uh… I worked at the fire station with Aidan before he left, although I might be working with him again it seems. What are you doing here? You a friend of his wife's? Because she seems a little drunk out there right now." He explained, pointing the neck of his beer bottle towards the door.

Phoebe's mouth fell open in shock, "What? That can't be. I'm Paige's sister, and she doesn't drink." She stated firmly, her mind already racing with scenarios. Was Paige's current state connected to the presence she felt in the house?

Isaac looked down at his beer, a look of betrayal on his face, "Aidan said that all of Paige's sisters were happily married…" He said meekly.

Phoebe let out an inaudible sigh, "Yeah… See, I-," She trailed off, suddenly realizing that Isaac had stopped moving. He had his beer raised to his lips, about to take a sip, and he had been standing like that for the past few seconds, "Um… Isaac?" She waved her hand over his eyes, before realizing that the noise of the party seemed to have come to a stop too. "Piper." Phoebe eventually decided, frowning as thought of why her eldest sister had frozen everyone in the house.

"It's comin'…" Lorna whispered, standing up and going towards Phoebe, staring intently at the door before running towards it, the middle Charmed One not far behind her, as the feeling that they had been sensing all night was finally culminating.

* * *

"Oh my God…" Piper breathed, setting down her unconscious niece onto the sofa bending down to check on Paige, who had fell to the floor the moment she tried to stand up to go check on her daughter, "Paige? Paige, wake up. Phoebe!" She yelled in the direction, hoping her sister would know something was wrong from the fact that everyone was frozen.

"What the hell happened?" Phoebe questioned, balancing Lorna on her hip and ignoring the goose bumps she had on her arms from the presence in the house, "Oh my God, what happened to Melinda?" She gasped, seeing her niece lying unconscious on the couch, "Piper, what is going on?"

"I was hoping you could you tell me! You're the one who's been sensing something all night!" The eldest Charmed One snapped back, "Whatever it is, I wouldn't class it as normal. Paige! C'mon! Get up!" She shouted, hitting the side of the witchlighter's face a little.

Phoebe turned around; her feeling of foreboding grew stronger as something passed through her. She turned towards the wall. Whatever this thing was, it was within the house, in the pipes, in the walls. Everywhere. "Reveal yourself!" She shouted, a globe of psionic energy appearing in front of her forehead before it flew towards the wall, crashing off of it and causing the whole house to shake from its foundations.

Slowly, small spheres of darkness began to come out of the walls, flying towards the same point in the living room and bringing themselves together into a form. Once a sufficient amount had gathered, both sisters could see that the spheres were actually black orbs. They spun around in a tornado like fashion, before snapping together and exploding in a deep purple light, leaving Piper's jaw to drop at who she saw.

He looked just like he had when he had been vanquished. Short black hair covered his head, as hair any longer in his line of work would prove a hindrance. The same rough stubble was on his chin, along with harsh brown eyes that glared at Phoebe, completing his 'bad boy' image. It was Hades the darklighter.

"Phoebe! Get behind the sofa!" Piper ordered, recognizing the man immediately and stepping in front of Paige's unconscious form. Fearlessly, the eldest Halliwell threw out her hands, the look of confidence vanishing from her face when nothing at all seemed to happen.

"You can't blow up a ghost…" Hades smirked, bringing his crossbow off his back strap with lightning speed and shooting at the unconscious toddler lying on the sofa. Piper's hands reacted quickly, freezing the arrow before it had barely left the weapon and blowing it up instantly afterwards. "You're good…" He growled, gritting his teeth.

"And you're evil." Piper said simply, at a complete loss at what to do. If her powers didn't work on him, then what was she supposed to do to try and stop him? As if her prayers were answered, a glowing psionic blast flew past her head, leaving a trail of psychic ripples as it did, before crashing into the darklighter's skull and sending him to the floor, "Phoebe! Get back behind the sofa! You're not putting your kid in danger!"

"Oh, and you're not in danger just standing there with ineffective powers? Gimme a break!" Her jaw dropped and her eyes widened, pointing at the evil being behind her sister, "Watch out!" She yelled.

Piper turned back around and took in a breath just in time, causing her body to be consumed with glowing orange cracks as she massed out, making the incoming energy ball to ricochet off her impervious chest and go back to its sender. The buzzing projectile, however, merely passed through Hades harmlessly, flying into the stair banister and reducing it to a pile of smoldering wood on the floor. "Oops…"

"You don't seem to get how being dead works, do you?" Hades sneered, "You can't hurt me…" He held out his hand, another energy ball appearing within his palm, "… But I can hurt you." He growled, swinging back his arm and preparing to fire, before he was distracted by a large icicle hurtling through his back and impaling itself in the wall after having no effect on the incorporeal darklighter.

"Get the _hell_ out of my house!" Aidan bellowed, the air beginning to ripple around his palm as he summoned a jet of concentrated water pressure into his palm. Wheeling his arm back, he threw it down the stairs, the ripple going straight through its target and hitting a small table next to door. The wood began to crack and smash as it crumbled underneath the pressure.

Hades turned to the elemental at the top of the stairs, "Oh, look who it is, Paige's runner up. You know, if things had of worked out correctly, Paige would have been the first person to ever give birth to a whitelighter-darklighter hybrid. Not your little water rats." He aimed his crossbow at Aidan, smirking, "But lucky for me, your water rats are part whitelighter."

Instead of aiming for Aidan, he moved his crossbow over to the left, aiming for Emma, who had been watching silently through the holes the banister. No one had seen her kneeling there, and no one once able to react fast enough to save her from the lethal attack. "Awoe!" The toddler croaked from her dry throat, holding her hand up through the banister. The arrow was immediately enveloped in a cloud of glowing bubbles that hovered in the air for one moment, before changing the arrow's direction and sending it sailing into Hades' shoulder.

The darklighter screamed in pain, his eyes widening with shock. He clearly hadn't been expecting to be injured. Pulling the arrow out with a wince, he threw it to the floor and took aim again. Emma had been affected by what had affected her sister and mother; she wouldn't be up for using her powers a second time. But before he could fire, Aidan bolted towards his daughter, wrapping her in his arms and vanishing in a torrent of water, not even leaving a puddle on the floor. The elemental reappeared in the living room beside Piper, staring at the spectral being with sheer rage before scooping up Melinda and splashing out again, presumably to a safer place than here.

Piper stared her enemy down, her hands out in front of her, completely frozen. All she could do was defend herself, there was no way she could harm Hades. Her ears twitched slightly when a buzzing reached her hearing. A swarm of particles passed by her swirling around before taking on Annabelle's form. The blonde immediately hurled a potion at the darklighter's feet, and a burst of green light instantly erupted from the floor, causing Hades to roar in anger as he was tore apart into a swarm of black and purple orbs scattered throughout the house once more, disappearing into the walls and into the floor.

"Is everybody okay?" She asked quietly.

Piper sighed, kneeling down and opening her arms as Lorna ran into them. She stood back up, glancing at an unconscious Paige in the floor before shaking her head in annoyance at how things had turned out. "I think it's safe to say the party's over…"

* * *

Piper laid the final life support crystal at the bottom of the living room archway. The stone glowed with a pale mint green, before magically connecting to its counterpart on the other side of the arch and raising a shimmering golden barrier over the entrance of the room that would keep the inhabitants alive for a little longer. He looked in, giving a fearful glance to Leo, Wyatt, Chris and Paige, each of them lying on a sofa, fighting for their lives.

"So what was that potion that you threw at Hades?" Piper questioned Annabelle as she walked into the sun room, folding her arms across her chest in the process. "I mean, it certainly wasn't your garden variety explosion potion."

The blonde looked up the Book of Shadows, "It's basically a stun potion for ghosts, it didn't get him out of the house, but it looks like he can't get out anyway. He's bound there by something." She frowned; looking down at the page she had stopped that, "Hmm… There's a hex in here to make a phantom corporeal, but since your personal powers aren't powerful enough to vanquish him…"

"Let's just keep that in the back of our heads. We might find a use for it." Piper said, turning to the stairs as Phoebe reached the bottom, crossing the secondary living room and flopping into the wicker one seater, "I take it Connor and Lorna are settled?" Piper asked, raising her eyebrow in a questioning way.

"Yeah, I just put Connor in Chris's bed for now. I hope that's okay." She smiled when her older sister nodded, "Okay, so does someone want to get me up to speed on this darklighter? What makes him to special to have made Aidan disappear the face off the earth with the twins? I'm guessing it all happened in the year I wasn't here."

Piper narrowed her eyes, thinking of the best way to spin the truth, "Um… Do you remember the big question mark hanging over Paige's head when she was pregnant? Whether the father was Aidan or-,"

Phoebe's eyes widened with shock as her jaw hit the floor, "Are you kidding me? I thought you guys vanquished him! How is he still alive and shooting arrows at my nieces?" She questioned both women, moving a little so Piper could sit next to her. "I mean, we've dealt with demons coming back from the dead, but not ghosts of darklighters that are after my sister."

"I'm more concerned with how he managed to poison them. Paige would have told us if a darklighter attacked, so that rules out any lingering poison from an arrow wound. Not to mention no darklighter would last long enough to shoot an elder, a Charmed One, and four powerful children." Piper stated, looking between Phoebe and Annabelle. "Unless he… You said that you felt a presence in the air, right?"

"Yeah, I couldn't get a read on what it was though, it was really weird." Phoebe replied.

"Well, Hades is a spirit now, and spirits move around in the air, expanding and contracting to whatever size they want. So what if he was somehow able to lace the air in Paige's house with darklighter poison?" Piper suggested to the other two for confirmation, "Think about it! Spirit or no, he's still a darklighter. I don't think it's completely out the realm of possibility."

"Still pretty farfetched though…" Phoebe said.

"No, no, I think she may be right." Annabelle argued, sitting up a little, "Paige has been in that house the longest, so it explains why she's got worse symptoms than Leo and the boys, since they've only been there for the evening." She pointed out, going back to look through the Book of Shadows.

"But then we have to two wild cards." Phoebe began, "Melinda and Emma. From what I saw, Melinda is the worst out of everyone while Emma seems to be just a little better than Chris and Wyatt. How do you explain that one, Sherlock?"

Piper bit her lip in thought for a moment, before clicking her fingers in triumph, "Gene dominance. Melinda's whitelighter side is stronger than Emma's, not to mention she's never been shot with darklighter poison for her body build up some natural immunity against it… So, now that we've worked out what's going on, how do we go about stopping it? Paige, Leo and Wyatt are out of it, and Aidan's vanished, so there's no way to heal them. It's just a race against time."

"Okay, how about me and Annabelle go back to the house, see if we can flush him and out and find a weak spot, while you try and find Aidan." Phoebe suggested, shrugging, "I mean, we've already seen that my powers can hurt him, so if things get ugly I should be there."

Piper raised an eyebrow at the idea, shaking her head, "Uh… Actually, I think the prospect of things getting ugly is exactly why you should hang back and try and find Aidan. You shouldn't put your baby in danger like you did when they jumped up from behind the sofa back there."

"Darklighter poison isn't going to hurt me or my baby." The middle Charmed One argued back.

"No it won't, but what do you think sensing all these negative emotions and feelings for the entire night has been doing?" Piper shot back calmly, "Anything that happens to you, happens to your baby, and what do you think bombarding her with everything you feel and sense is doing to her?"

Phoebe sat dumbstruck. For once in her life, she was speechless. For the past two months, she had been acting as if she wasn't pregnant at all, using her powers whenever she pleased. Was this sort of thing really traumatizing? Phoebe then realized instantly that a baby needed to be nurtured from the moment it was conceived, which was something she had been lacking extremely, "Um… You're right…" She cleared her throat, "You should go and see what you can find out… I'll scry for Aidan with Paige's wedding ring… See if that works…"

"Phoebe…"

"I'm alright… Just go, we don't have a lot of time…" She murmured, fumbling with her hands before she stood up, walking towards the living room and passing straight through the golden barrier as she went to retrieve Paige's wedding ring.

"Uh… I guess we'd better get some of those ghost stun potions from the kitchen then." Piper said uncertainly, staring into the living room after her little sister, before rising to her feet and heading for the kitchen, guilt eating away at her conscience.

* * *

Aidan sighed as he pushed back a strand of her curl hair from Emma's face. The toddler was sleeping peacefully after being healed by her father, along with her sister, who was sleeping next to her in the large bed in the elemental's Atlantian bedroom. "I'm not going to let anything bad happen to either of you…" He whispered, getting up from the bed and going towards the tall window on the north side of the bedroom.

A pale white glow caught his attention from behind his back and she turned around. A tornado of swirling bright lights was illuminating the room as they brought a person forth. There was a small flash of light as the globes began to fade away, leaving Phoebe standing in their place. "Wow, no wonder scrying didn't work. You've been hiding out here." Phoebe commented, looking around the dark room and remembering the familiar décor from when she had stormed the castle with Pamela and her sisters.

"What are you doing here? How'd you find me?" He hissed, aware of the fact that his children were sleeping soundly in the bed a few feet away. He gently took his sister in law by the arm and led her to the door, taking her out of the room and into the hallway. "Well?"

Phoebe smirked as she raised her hand, revealing Paige's wedding ring in her hand. "I used a return to sender spell on this. I figured it would work since you did give this to Paige after all. Even a place like this isn't impenetrable from magic; it's just a matter of finding your way around your obstacles." She explained, grabbing Aidan's wrist and shoving the ring into his palm, "And I'm here because your wife and three of your in laws are dying and you're the only one who can save them. What the hell were you thinking?"

"I was thinking about getting my kids away from that bastard of a darklighter. And what are you talking about? I thought Leo would have just healed Paige, that's the main reason I just took the girls." He leaned against the wall, shaking his head at the floor, "Dammit… I vanquished him myself. How the hell did he get out of that one?"

The middle Charmed One sighed, folding her arms, "I dunno, but we got to find a way to undo it, because he's killing every whitelighter in our family and right now, you're our only hope. So you need to pull yourself together…"

The elemental sighed, shooting a look at her, "How…?"

Phoebe's left eye twitched in anger, "Well, I have an idea. Get over it." Aidan looked at her in shock before she began to advance on him, "You're angry at Paige for something that she wasn't even aware of doing at the time. She was evil! What did you expect her to do? She's paid her penance for that, and lemme tell you, she's put up with a whole lot more crap from you than you ever had to from her. So suck it up. Shut up. And help us."

Aidan stared at her for a few moments, staying silent and taking in Phoebe's words. He closed his eyes, sighing loudly before finally giving her his answer. "Let's go."

* * *

"Do you think I was a little hard on her back there?" Piper asked Annabelle, looking around the living room and foyer of Paige's house with a flashlight guiding her way, "I mean, she's been acting a little reckless, but nothing horrible. Maybe I should just get off her case and let her deal with this pregnancy in her own way." She muttered, looking up at the ceiling and casting a circle of light on the surface.

"Well, you wouldn't be the overprotective sister if you that, now would you?" Annabelle smirked, "I've dealt with a few empaths in my time, and every one of them has been extremely strong willed. Pregnancies are tricky, especially for the more powerful ones like Phoebe. With so many emotions flying around, it's hard to keep track on what you yourself are feeling. Just give her time."

"Sounds like you've dealt with pregnant empaths before." Piper said in a questioning tone.

"Not exactly. When I was…" She trailed off, avoiding the eldest Charmed One's eye contact and looking around wildly with her flashlight, "It's nothing, never mind." She scowled, obviously angry at herself for whatever slip up she had just barely managed to avoid.

Piper looked at her strangely for a few seconds, before returning to their previous topic of conversation, "I dunno… Maybe I'm suffocating her or something? I wasn't around for her first pregnancy so I don't really know how to adapt to her mood. That and Brennan's not here to go through it with her, which just sucks." She growled, suddenly spinning around and casting the glow from her flashlight her, "I could've sworn…"

"Try and stay calm. Phantoms and poltergeists feed off fear, they really are the scourge of magic, absorbing other people's dark emotions. Vile creatures…" Annabelle sneered, looking around, "Okay, so much for this guy being a powerful being, he won't even show himself to us."

"Well, the first time he appeared wasn't by choice. Phoebe fired a psionic blast at the wall and he was forced out. Do you think we should try throwing one of those stun potions at the wall and see happens?" Piper suggested, pointing her flashlight at the place where Phoebe had fired her mental assault.

Annabelle shrugged, putting her hand into her pocket and pulling out the mint green vial. She threw it at the wall, the glass smashing instantly and allowing the substance to drip down the paint. The potion began to sizzle against the wall, before the same thing that had happened before began to take place. Dark orbs flew from every corner of the house, culminating in the foyer before finally taking on the form of Hades, who held out his arms in a taunting fashion, "Miss me?"

"No." Piper retorted simply, "And I have a feeling we won't even miss you when we get you out of this house and into the hellhole you should be burning in." She spat, "How did you manage to hold on anyway? Demons don't exactly have that option."

He glared at her, putting his hands together in a praying position and smiling, "I'm not a demon, I'm a darklighter. There's a difference. Not that it matters in this case however, as it was that little chunk of doubt in Paige's mind that I clung onto, the part that secretly wishes for the evil life… Speaking of Paige, did you ever wonder about how her kids would have turned out if I had been the father?"

"Actually, no, because the thought of me being blood related to you in anyway is making me want to blow chunks." Piper growled back, shining her flashlight in his general direction to try and take away the unknown of darkness.

"Aw… Too bad, because I've been working on a little surprise for Paige ever since I was vanquished. You see, being a ghost, I can travel into other realms… Other times… I can see the 'what if's, and thanks to that, I was able to come up these!" He gestured to his sides, still smiling.

Two columns of dark orbs fell from the ceiling, landing on both sides of the darklighter and leaving two people in their places. They were twin boys, around eighteen or nineteen. Both of them had messy black hair that fell that covered their soft brown eyes, their muscular builds were covered up by the baggy black jeans and t-shirts they were wearing. They were completely identical, apart from the fact that one of them had a scar that run over his top lip, over his mouth and to the bottom of his chin.

"Meet Sam and Craig." Hades beamed, placing his hands on each of the boy's shoulders, "Your nephews, Piper. The ones that make you sick at the very thought of being related to them. I think it's quite obvious where Paige got the name Sam from, but did you know that the father that raised her was called Craig Matthews? I think you can make up the rest for yourselves. These two are a lot better than those two water rats, don't you agree?"

"You really are sick…" Piper spat, not even wanting to think about having to vanquish her 'nephews'. This was probably the main reason he had conjured them. The Charmed Ones' aversion for going up against family was something that they were known for, and was something that had been exploited many times over the years.

"Craig, would you please escort these two out of the house? We'll deal with them later." Hades ordered, "Sam would help him, but he has that temperamental magical essence thing that one of the water rats has… Prevents him from using his powers a lot, which is a real shame, don't you think?"

The twin with the scar on his lip stepped forward, "Front step." He ordered in a deep voice, gesturing towards the two women.

Piper and Annabelle were suddenly enveloped in a thick swathe of black and purple orbs that carried them away from the place where they had once stood. The dark lights reappeared on the front step of the house, the front door still open from when Piper and Annabelle had entered in the first place. The two women turned around, only to be faced with Hades' grin. "See you later…" He taunted, flicking his fingers at the door and telekinetically shutting it over with a low creak.

**TO BE CONTINUED**


	8. Dark Lights Will Guide You Home, Part II

**Dark Lights Will Guide You Home Part 2**

Piper dove over the sofa in Paige's living room, letting out an inaudible wince from the scorching flames that had singed her ankle as she jumped for cover behind Paige's couch. She looked up, stumbling slightly on her injured foot. Craig stood with his hand still raised; smoke billowing from his palm as an after effect from shooting fire. "I don't want to hurt you." He said, his deep voice cracked slightly as he spoke, lowering his arm from its offensive position.

"Then go back to wherever you came from." Piper said back, opening her fist as a potion fell from her sleeve and landed in her palm. She hurled the vial at her 'nephew's' chest, but the concoction only succeeded in creating a small combustion of cold blue fire on his torso, "That was the most powerful vanquishing potion we had…" She breathed, before collecting herself and throwing out her hand, using her geokinetic abilities to manipulate gravity and make it drag Craig across the room, pinning him to the wall with a suffocating crush.

"You can't vanquish us… You don't have the power…" He coughed out, obviously finding it hard to breath underneath Piper's gravity strangle hold. "There's only one way to truly get rid of us… And you'd never risk it." He smirked, holding the eldest Charmed One's stare as she advanced upon him, her hand still raised.

"I've spent the last hour beating the crap out of my nephews. What makes you think I wouldn't risk it?" She said darkly. "What's your se…" She trailed off as two people suddenly fell down the stairs, at a war with each other still as they tumbled down each step, somehow not even registering that they were falling down a flight of stairs.

Annabelle was the first to recover from the fall, rolling over from her lying position and delivering a solid punch to Sam's gut before leaping to her feet while the teenager groaned in pain. He glared at her, momentarily distracting the mercenary long enough to kick her in the ankles, bringing to the floor again. The two clamped on to each other's shoulders, Sam's physical strength easily greater than Annabelle's as they wrestled each other into a standing position.

The teen suddenly let go of his opponent, clenching his fist and throwing it towards Annabelle's mouth. The blonde stumbled back from the force of the punch, raising the back of her hand to her mouth to wipe away from of the blood. She bared her blood covered teeth to Sam, turning her head to the side and spitting out the crimson liquid to the floor, "Didn't your mother ever teach you not to hit a lady?" She growled, flying at her enemy and punching him in the jaw, causing him to stumble back as she had did, "Especially if you hit like a girl."

"You have no idea what I'm capable of." Sam growled, throwing out his hand from his side and releasing a bright burst of multi-coloured light that hit Annabelle hard in the chest. The blonde was thrown across the foyer, landing in the dining room and falling through the glass table in the process, smashing it with her person with a loud crash.

"Annabelle!" Piper shouted, letting go of her geokinetic grip on Craig and running to her friend. She stepped over Sam, who had now broken out into a sweat and was struggling to breathe, much like his female counterpart. The eldest Charmed One inspected the women lying in the bed of glass. Her face had been cut from all the sharp shards of material flying around, along with a large patch of ice and frost covering her chest. She was in no fit state to bail them out.

Craig knelt down beside his brother, shaking his head and sighing at the fact that Sam had been stupid enough to use his powers. Standing up, he raised his hand, a plume of deep red fire burning in his palm. Piper had her back to him as she lifted Annabelle into a sitting position. He could take her out and finish this. He had fought his aunt three times in the past hour, always with the same result; he had the chance to break that tie…

But he didn't, "Halliwell Manor!" He boomed, gesturing towards the two women with his free hand and enveloping them in a cloud of black and purple orbs that carried them up through the ceiling and away from the battle. "Sorry, Dad…"

* * *

Phoebe grabbed a golden tassel from the top of the Book of Shadow's spine, bringing it down in the page she looking at and using it the bookmark. She closed the tome over, the silver triquetra shimmering in the soft light of the attic. The middle Charmed tenderly run her hand across it, letting out a sigh, "Give me strength…" She groaned, before picking up the ancient book and carrying it towards the door, heading downstairs. 

She made her way down, looking into the living room as she descended. Piper sat in the love seat, a white glow being cast over her from Leo's hands as he repaired her superficial wounds. Her ankle was relieved of its burn, and the stitching of her jeans began to knit back together, completing the process. "You okay? You seem to come back even worse every time you go after the twins." Leo asked kindly, stroking the side of his wife's face in concern.

Piper raised her hand, gripping his in hers gently and giving it a squeeze, "Yeah, I'm fine; although I think those kids both need a serious grounding. In what reality is throwing fire at your aunt thought to be acceptable behaviour? Paige screwed up royally as a parent wherever those two came from."

"Yeah, well, I'd rather take the flame thrower any day. The other one fights dirty, and I'm sick of having my teeth knocked out for the third time tonight…" Annabelle growled, her mouth twitching uncomfortably.

"It sounds like you gave as good you got." Phoebe smirked, setting the Book of Shadows down on the living room table and opening it up at the page she had marked, "I think I found the power that one of the twins hit you with. Was it Sam? Or Craig?" She asked, looking up at the two women for confirmation.

"I think Craig is the one that can use his powers, so it would be Sam, as he started sweating as soon as he threw Annabelle into that table." Piper informed her younger sister, attempting to look at the book from an upside down angle, "So, what power was it? I'm guessing it had something to do with ice?"

"You would be correct." Phoebe replied, beginning to read from the book, "Although it is extremely rare, it has been known for a witch's cryokinetic abilities to manifest in the form of lights. It was brought about when a coven in the Northern reaches would pray to the Aurora Borealis centuries ago, forming a pact with the mystical show of lights and drawing on its power through ice." The witch shrugged at the entry, "I guess it sorta makes sense… Mel and Emma have the whole 'light and dark' thing; these guys have a fire and ice deal going on…"

"So how do we get rid of them? We've went up against them three times with different strategies, and each time we get the same result." Annabelle asked, falling into the sofa with an eyebrow raised, "We've tried athames, our own powers, potions… Short of you guys doing your Power of Three thing, I think we're out of ideas."

Piper shot the idea down immediately, shaking her head, "No, we're not bringing Paige into this. Telling her that she has to vanquish her hypothetical sons would just open up a can worms which we should really just leave alone. Besides, what if the Power of Three didn't work? Then she'd have more time to sit with the information and maybe not even give us her full support."

"There's an extremely slim chance of the Power of Three being ineffective." Leo pointed out, "I mean, how many times have you proven that over the years? But I think you're right, Paige should be kept out of the loop. Who knows how she would react to all this?" He asked rhetorically, sitting down on the arm of the sofa.

"But she knows Hades is in her house. She's going to want to be around for killing his sorry ass." Phoebe replied, beginning to look through the book again with an angry sigh, "Why is there nothing on dealing with counterparts in here?" She growled, slamming it shut, "Useless…"

Piper shrugged, "Well, you know how that thing works. It something isn't in there, it'll appear as soon as we've learnt it, in beautiful calligraphy too. Like the limited info we have on our bald power stealer. Everything we know about him is in there…" She placed her hand gently on the cover. "What?" She asked, seeing Annabelle chewing on her thumb in thought.

"Nothing… It's just that Phoebe got me thinking when she said something about counterparts." She replied, her brow creasing as racked her brain for anything she may have seen in the book that could be useful, "Do you think maybe Melinda and Emma are the keys to vanquishing them?" She asked, moving to open the book before Leo pointed at her hand.

"How are you still bleeding? I healed you. Are you alright?" He asked, frowning at the smattering of blood all over the back of the mercenary's hand.

Annabelle looked down, tutting and shaking her head in disgust, "Oh, that would be from when I hooked your nephew in the face. I don't think you're powerful enough to return this blood to his gums. He totally deserved it too; something tells that kid didn't have many boundaries when he was little." She went to turn another page, before Phoebe suddenly lunged out and grabbed her wrist. "What are you doing?"

"Do _not_ wash that hand." The middle Charmed One said firmly, "I think I have a plan."

* * *

"Just how sure are you that this plan is going to work?" Annabelle asked uncertainly, giving Phoebe a look as the middle Charmed One rubbed a poppet in the still moist blood on her hand. "We might be able to find a more full proof way to use this blood instead of just wasting it on a failed spell." 

"I'm positive." She replied, grabbing a maker pen from the Book of Shadow's altar and drawing a female symbol on the side of the poppet that wasn't covered in blood. She laid it down beside another doll, which had been blessed and marked in the exact same way, "With the boys having so much in common with Melinda and Emma, these poppets will call to the teen versions of the girls from time and space. All we need to do is focus the aim of a desire spell. It'll bring them into our time so they can deal with Sam and Craig themselves."

Piper stood at the copper potion pot, throwing in the ingredients that Phoebe had instructed, before pausing, "Uh… Pheebs? I'm not sure if we have any dragonfly wings left. Could you take over stirring duty while I go check the kitchen?"

The middle Halliwell sister, turned around, biting her lip, "Um… I probably shouldn't." She replied, gesturing towards the smoke and steam brimming over the side of the pot, "It's just that second hand smoke is just as dangerous as smoking a cigarette, and I…" She trailed off, closing her eyes slowly and sorrowfully.

"I'll take over." Annabelle quickly jumped in, walking past Phoebe and taking the spatula from Piper, "And I'm pretty sure we still have some dragonfly wings left. They should be in the cupboard to the right, the one under the toaster." She replied, beginning to stir as Piper walked off towards the door.

"Wait a minute!" Phoebe shouted, narrowing her eyes at a jar in the dresser on the far side of the attic. She walked across, grabbing the jar and cringing at its contents before turning around with an eyebrow raised, "Dragonfly wings… Lots and lots of them…" She murmured, giving Piper a questioning glance.

The eldest Charmed One hesitated for a moment, before breaking out into a bout of nervous laughter, "Oh! Silly me! I completely forgot about those…" The volume of her voice got lower as she spoke, along with her confidence, "Let's just drop these in, shall we? You got the spell ready?"

"Yeah." Phoebe replied, picking up the blessed poppets from the table and walking towards the smoking copper pot, her steps getting smaller and smaller as she neared it, before taking in a breath and striding confidently the rest of the way.

Piper took the spell from her sister, laying it down in front of them before taking a poppet for herself and gripping Phoebe's hand in hers, beginning to chant together, "Figures of desire, we free you here… Dance in flames, go far and near…" They both dropped their poppets into the pot, causing the amount of smoke blooming from the cauldron to intensify, "Grant us now, bring to this place… What we summon through time and space…"

There was a bright flash, before a massive cloud of swirling white lights appeared in the centre of the room. It was the biggest culmination of magical lights that either witch had seen, making them feel a little apprehensive at the raw power in the air. The duo squinted through the brightness, trying to see what was happening within the wall of magic that was spinning like a tornado in the attic. It was after around a minute when the lights began to slow their spinning. The harshness of the light began to fade, along with the globes themselves, leaving the two Charmed Ones with something a lot more than they had expected. Four figures stood on the rug in the attic, three of which the sisters recognized, there was another that was a complete stranger.

Melinda stood with her dark green eyes darting around the room. She clearly realized that she had been summoned, unlike the last time. Her long, blonde hair seemed was tied back into a ponytail, revealing thin layer of dark brown hair that was normally hidden underneath her more dominant colour of hair. Low riding jeans revealed the top of a red rose that sat just next to her left hip bone, while the white tank top she was wearing almost reached the top petal of the floral tattoo. "What the…?"

Emma couldn't have been more different to her twin sister if she tried. Her curly blonde-brown hair fell down her back, hardly even reaching her shoulder blades. The green of her eyes stood out fiercely against the light smattering of jet black eye shadow that made the area around her eyes seem even deeper. Her baggy jeans scraped the floor, only leaving the toes of her white sneakers visible while the teenager fidgeted with her hands underneath the long sleeves of her black blouse that dipped down the centre of her torso, just leaving enough to the imagination, "Aw, crap…"

Faith looked the most calm out of all four figures. She casually surveyed the room with warm, brown eyes. The tanned complexion she got from her father seemed to fit with the black jeans that she wore, although they weren't nearly as low as her older cousin's. What she was wearing on her top half was covered by a brown suede jacket that was zipped up or her neck. She looked at the two witches with a bored expression, moving a strand of dark brown hair away from her face in the process, "Ugh… Now what?"

It was the forth that had everyone stumped. She, unlike the other three, wasn't dressed for a typical night out. She was dressed her pajamas it seemed, her blue eyes wide with fear as she stared at the strangers through her sophisticated pair of spectacles. Her pajama top had a large imprint of a cartoon cat, and nothing was on her feet. The girl dropped the glass of water in her hand, looking around from side to and causing her glossy, deep red hair to switch from shoulder to shoulder, "What's going on?"

Piper frowned at the girl for a few moments. She seemed so familiar, as if she had seen her in a dream or far in the past. It annoyed her that she couldn't figure it out, as the girl had clearly been called by the spell for a reason, and she didn't see how summoning a stranger would help them. The eldest Charmed One pondered over the possibilities for a few more seconds, before her eyes widened in realization.

"_Lorna!_"

* * *

Paige took in a deep breath as she inhaled the clean air around her. She looked towards the glowing city of Atlantis, the floating street lights hovering through every alleyway and avenue that could be taken by anyone in the kingdom. It was a little cold, she thought, wrapping her arms around herself before she felt a hand on her shoulder. She flinched in surprise, turning around to see her husband facing her. "Hey." 

"Hey…" Aidan replied, walking towards the edge of the balcony, his hand brushing down her arm in the process. He turned around so his back was facing the city that he ruled over, so he could look Paige in the way. The elemental folded his arms, sighing, "So… Who's going to be the first to break the silence?"

The witchlighter smiled sorrowfully, walking over to the railing and delicately placing her hands on the turquoise metal, running her hand across the pattern etched in the material, "I don't understand how you can be angry at me for something I had no conscious control over." She finally admitted, "I mean, I would think that our two daughters would be proof enough that you won." She spat sarcastically, biting her lip in frustration.

"I know… I don't understand either." Aidan replied, shaking his head as he looked down, "It's just that we've been through hell and back to get to where we are now, and this feels like some black cloud hanging over everything that we've worked for." He tried to explain, still staring at the floor.

"And all the crap that you did doesn't put a few blotches in our fairy tale?" Paige asked sourly, "Do you know what I was feeling when I found out that I was pregnant?" She whispered, looking down at the castle walls, "At first, I hoped to God that the test was wrong, and that I wouldn't need to go through it alone… But do you know what was going through my head right after that? I thought that if the test was right, that I would want it, with every fiber of by being, to be your child. Not some darklighter that could only get me when I was evil!" She looked up at him, her lips pursed tightly, "And if you can't believe that, and that I love you, then I think we've wasted the last five years of both of our lives…"

The two of them stood in silence, before a small vibrating noise reached their ears. A channel of swirling particles came from the sky and flew in between them before coiling into a tornado and forming Annabelle. Her usually sleek blonde hair was a complete mess, "Christ! That is a _lot_ of barriers!" She cursed loudly, before sensing the tension between the two people, "Am I interrupting something?"

"No." Paige said quietly, her voice cracking with just one word, "What is it?"

Annabelle looked at the two of them. Seeing that she had clearly came in at an inappropriate time, "Um… Piper and Phoebe sent me to come and get you. They need your help for… something. Just a little spell gone slightly awry… Nothing to worry about or anything."

"Um… Okay…" She croaked back, moving across to the blonde and taking her hands. "I'll be back later." She said to Aidan, "Just make sure Wyatt and Chris don't catch on, because they'll orb out of here and want to help…" The witchlighter warned, "Do you think you can get out the same way you got in?"

Annabelle sighed, mentally limbering herself up for the task of getting through the transportation barriers of Atlantis, "Sure, just hold tight and prepare yourself." She warned, gripping onto Paige's wrists tightly and vanishing in a flurry of particles that flew into the night sky, leaving Aidan with his thoughts.

* * *

"Useless boy…" Hades growled as he sneered down at his son who was lying on the sofa, recovering from the physical shock he suffered from using his powers. "What good was conjuring him when you seem to be the one that does all the fighting?" He looked up, glaring at Craig, who was sitting on the opposite sofa, his feet on the coffee table as he stared to the dark street, "And why did you help them escape when you could have easily killed Piper and the blonde?" 

Craig looked down, turning the silver chain on his wrist over and over again, "You said you wanted to take out the Power of Three. If I had killed Piper, the other two would have come at us in an emotional rage that would have boosted their strength and destroyed us easily. I would have thought you of all people wouldn't want that to happen." He replied with a hint of venom, "Why you can't do your own dirty work is beyond me…"

Hades was standing over him in a flash, bringing his fist down hard on the teenager's cheek, "Don't you dare talk to me like that!" He hissed. "I conjured you, and I can take away that life just easily…"

Craig winced in pain, already feeling the skin beginning to swell, "How did you do that? I thought you were incorporeal…" He whispered, still nursing his cheek like a small boy as he looked up to his father.

"Like I said, I conjured you. You're bound to me, and it allows me certain privileges that I don't have with other humans." He grabbed Craig's chin, forcing him to look up at him, "Remember that the next time you think of giving me attitude…" The darklighter growled, moving back over to Sam in the same instantaneous way he had traveled before, "Now, let's send you back to the Void." He said lowly to the unconscious teen, "You're no use to me sweating on a couch…" Hades spat, raising his hand over Sam and preparing to reverse the ritual.

Thinking fast, Craig jumped from the sofa, "No!" He cried, causing his father to stop and look at him with frustration and confusion. He had to think of something, "Um… We're twins. Spiritually and magically bound… If you send him away, you'll send me away too…" He said meekly, "And then you're left to deal with the Charmed Ones your own."

Hades glared at him, trying to figure out if he was telling the truth or not. He brought his arm back to his side, giving his son a doubtful look, before beginning to walk into the foyer, "Call me when he wakes up. I'm going to go and prepare the house for our guests." He warned, dissolving into a column of dark orbs that dispersed throughout the house, melting into the walls.

Craig let out a relieved sigh, sitting down on the coffee table and playfully hitting his unconscious brother on the arm. His voice began to crack as he spoke, a trait he got from his mother, "Don't worry, bro. I'm gonna get us away from him…"

* * *

"Um… Are you okay in there?" Piper asked cautiously as she sat on the edge of her bed. She turned around, still seeing no one at the doorway of her closet, which was why she jumped when Lorna's head suddenly came around the corner, smiling timidly before stepping out, fully dressed in a casual outfit of Piper's as she held her pajamas in her hands. 

"Yeah, thanks for the clothes, by the way. Mine must be the most embarrassing time travel debut of all time." She smiled, noticing as Piper kept rolling her hands around each other and was blinking, "You're nervous, I get that. It's okay. I don't blame you for being nervous, I'm nervous too. I mean, why wouldn't you be nervous? Why wouldn't _I_ be nervous? Maybe-,"

"Do you realize that you've said the word 'nervous' five times during that little ramble without even taking a breath?" Piper smiled, beginning to loosen up slightly, "Now, you see, this is what happens when you're raised by an overreacting martyr." She joked, sitting down on the bed. "So, what age are you? I mean, the last time we did this, Mel and Emma were nineteen, so have we taken you from the same time? Or…?"

Lorna thought the statement through a little before speaking, "I don't really know if I should answer that… I mean, future knowledge and all?" She smiled nervously a little, before narrowing her eyes, "Actually, I don't think knowing our ages would do much, but then again-,"

"You like to think things through, don't you?" Piper smiled, "That's a good thing though, I'm glad to see that you have some common sense."

"Yeah… I guess I've taken Leo's advice to heart way too times that it actually stuck. You guys are always a little protective of me." Lorna explained, folding her arms in a fashion that took Piper by surprise at how much the simple gesture reminded her of herself, "Although you're even worse with Wyatt and Chris, who are always up to something, no matter what age they are." She grinned, obviously thinking of the many memories she had of her foster brothers' antics.

"Oh, so the three of you all get along perfectly?" Piper asked with a hopeful tone.

The redhead shrugged, pushing her glasses back her nose as she did, "Well, we've had our differences, but it's just the normal kind of things that you'd expect from brothers and sisters. They're great. They scared off quite a few bullies; Emma does that too, that girl can argue."

Piper's eyes widened with fury, "You were _bullied_? Give me the names of these kids and I'll get to them while they're still toddlers!" She exclaimed, slamming her fist off the mattress before sighing, "Oh God… Please don't say I was one of those parents that is oblivious to the trauma of their child…" She cried out, putting her hand to her head.

Lorna let out a laugh, but it came to a stop instantly when she snorted and she covered her mouth in embarrassment, her blue eyes widening with surprise, "Aw, man… Even in a different time I'm a geek." She groaned, having to put her glasses back up once more, "Oh, right! Your question!" Lorna suddenly remembered, "No, you weren't one of those parents…" She smiled slightly, "You and Leo are…" The redhead paused, trying to figure out the right word to describe the couple.

Before she could finish her sentence, a crash sounded from downstairs. Piper's head flipped around to the door to where the noise was coming from. She groaned loudly and got to her feet, clomping out of the room at a fast pace. Lorna followed suit, shaking her head and smiling nostalgically, "Ah… Some things never change."

* * *

"I told you it was going to be a bumpy ride!" Annabelle spat at Paige, who was currently grumbling to herself as she tried to get up from the wreckage of the living room coffee table. "Maybe you should talk to your husband and get him to lower some of those stupid force fields. I mean, why does a city with a massive magical army even need them?" She asked, standing up and brushing down her clothes. 

"_You_ ask him!" Paige immaturely replied, pouting as she too checked her clothes for any sawdust that was disturbed by the table's destruction, "Ugh, looks like I'm gonna be cleaning up more than a spell now. Piper is going to freak out!" She exclaimed, looking down at the wrecked piece of furniture.

Piper stormed down the stairs and into the foyer, her hands raised so she was ready to attack any demon that had caused the crash. She rounded into the living room, Lorna by her side. "Annabelle!" She cried, seeing the broken coffee table and letting her hands fall to her sides, "That was new!"

"I'm sorry, I'll get kill some demons for other demons tomorrow and buy you a new one." Annabelle replied, glaring at Piper when she gave her a doubtful glance, "You're from the future." The blonde addressed Lorna, "Do I get her a new table?"

Lorna nodded, smirking as she did, "You do, and Piper here is secretly glad that you broke it, because Leo picked it out and he has horrible taste. Oddly enough, he doesn't even notice that it's a different one, well, not until… I should probably shut up…" She trailed off, pursing her lips as if to stop herself from letting out any more future knowledge.

"Wait a minute; she's from the fu…? Lorna?" Paige whispered in shock, narrowing her eyes and inspecting the teenager with amazement, "What's going on? And please say she's the only one, I don't have the patience or strength right now to deal anyone else…" She groaned, letting her chin droop to her chest.

"Um… Well…" Piper moved to her sister's side, linking their arms before walking towards the sofa and sitting down, "We should probably fill you in on what's been happening while you've been away. You just need to promise me that you'll just shut up through it and let me talk, and then you can ask whatever questions you want. Okay?" Paige nodded slowly, not sure what was going on. "Alright then…"

* * *

Phoebe stifled a yawn as she looked out into the dark suburban street that her house sat on. She perched herself on the window ledge, shifting the curtain slightly and watching with sheer confusion as she watched Mrs. Hunter walk along the dark sidewalk with her son's dog. The middle Charmed One checked her watch, looking back again to see the old woman smile eerily at her from the other side of the street. "That woman is just all kinds of crazy…" She muttered. 

"It might interest you to know that she doesn't really change." Faith said from behind her, making Phoebe jump with surprise. The teen completely ignored her mother's reaction, choosing to watch their neighbour, "I think the latest we've ever seen her out was around twelve thirty-five. Freaky, huh?"

The middle Charmed One raised her eyebrows, "Wow, she's still alive and creeping us out in your time? What age are you anyway?" She asked, watching Faith carefully so she could pick up any body language that would indicate is she was lying or not.

"Sixteen." She replied simply, moving away from the window and flicking her hair to her back as she did, "And you yanked me away from something very important, I was about to out to a party!" Faith complained, turning around to glare at her mother, as she was obviously to blame for the teen not being out in the first place.

"So does that mean that we took you from the same time of day as us? Oh, that explains why Lorna was in her pajamas… I'm guessing that she was having a quiet night in or something?" Phoebe suggested, shifting the curtain back and folding her arms over her chest.

Faith sorted out a laugh, "Yeah, or it could be that she's a loser." She sneered, shoving her hands in her pockets before catching a heated look from her mother, "Wow, no matter what time I'm in, I always get that look…" She grumbled, before looking towards the stairs as Melinda and Emma came down them. Emma was holding Connor's favourite baseball cap, it had been given to him by Brennan on his last visit home.

"Connor loses this when he's six. Make sure that doesn't happen, it means a lot to him, alright?" Emma shook the cap in her aunt's face, before setting it down in the dining table and taking quick glances at everyone in the room, "So, are we still waiting for Lorna to get dressed? Or can we just go and kick some half-brother ass?"

Phoebe's eyebrows rose in surprise, "You know, you seem to be taking this awfully well, considering the fact that you're here just to kill family." She said.

"We're here to do what we're destined to do." Melinda quickly replied, swiping strands of her hair away from her face, "Ugh, I hate wearing my hair like this…" She growled, pulling out the clip and letting her hair fall to its natural position. She shook it slightly with her hands, trying to get rid of any evidence of it being up, "That's better."

"I think what my sister was trying to say before she distracted by her hair…" Emma shot a look at her twin, who gave her a glare in return, "… Is that we know how all this plays out, because we've heard stories about your adventures." She simply explained, "It's just a matter of following what you guys told us about the situation and the future stays intact."

"And that includes letting Aunt Piper and Aunt Phoebe figure out for themselves why the spell summoned you and Lorna, Faith." Melinda warned, pursing her lips and giving her youngest cousin a warning.

The teen rolled her eyes, "I know…" She groaned, before making a quick gesture with her hand, "Witch's honour!" She said theatrically with a put on smile, before returning to her normal self. "Although I don't think it really matters considering they figure out pretty quickly anyway."

"You know, if you're trying to keep future knowledge, you may want to not talk about it while a past person is in the room." Phoebe suggested with a smirked, laying her hands on the back of a chair at the table, "So, mind telling me why the spell did summon Faith and Lorna?" She asked her two nieces casually, hoping they would know.

Emma smirked in response, "Nice try." She looked at her watch, letting out a groan, "God, what is taking Lorna so long to get dressed? She never takes this long for these things, that's one of the main reasons she's _awesome_." The teen emphasized, glaring at Faith, who merely rolled her eyes.

"Whatever…" She mumbled in response, "Seriously, what college freshman is in their pajamas and ready to bed by eleven thirty? She should be out partying; instead she just sits in her dorm room, studying…"

"Faith, you're sixteen, what the hell do you even know about college?" Melinda spat, straightening herself up so she could take part in the argument.

Before the youngest out of them all could respond, a large of cloud of orbs lit up in the dining room entrance. Each of them had to squint their eyes slightly to avoid the glare of blue and white light as Piper, Paige and Lorna formed. A tornado of particles soon brought Annabelle into the house, bringing together the blonde's instantly.

"Did you get her up to speed?" Phoebe asked Piper.

The eldest Charmed One opened her mouth to respond, but Paige got there before her, stepping out in front of the two people she had transported, "Yeah, she did. Are we ready to do this?" She looked to her future daughters, "Or more importantly, are you two ready to do this?"

Melinda and Emma exchanged a nervous glance, before nodding together, "Mom…" Melinda began, moving towards Paige, only to have the witchlighter step back slightly and put her hands up as if to ward her away.

"Later… Okay?" Paige said with a pleading tone, "I just want this over quickly so I don't have time to think it through…"

The witchlighter went to raise her hands to her face, but she was distracted when hundreds of tiny black spheres began to spin rapidly around her. It didn't take long for a purple haze to gather around her, making her vanish from everyone's sight as she was swallowed by a violet cloud that flew up through the ceiling.

* * *

Paige reappeared, immediately being filled with a feeling of dread as she took in her surroundings. She was standing in the bedroom of her new house. She felt her hands being forced together and looked down to see bands of black orbs around her wrists, putting them together before becoming one solid cuff, trapping her hands. The witchlighter crunched up her eyes, attempting to orb out, only to find that she still stood in the same place. 

"That little bracelet will bind your powers and keeps those pesky hands out of harms way." Hades informed her from behind, making Paige jump in surprise and turn around to face her two sons for the first time. Both of them were wearing looks of regret, which made her suspicious, but nowhere near scared. "Nice to see you again, Paige…"

"What do you want?" She spat back, giving him a heated glare.

He stepped forward in front of his sons, grinning, "You and your sisters. Dead. What else of course?"

* * *

"Okay, we can't wait for Leo to get back from the Elders." Piper said strongly, rubbing her palms together as she paced the attic, "They've taken Paige, and God knows what they're doing to her. We need to move fast." She decided, suddenly spinning around to face her sister, who was currently filling up a satchel of ghost stun potions at the copper cauldron. "Phoebe, are you going to come with us?" 

The middle Charmed One shrugged uncertainly, "I guess… My powers are the only thing that can hurt him when he's incorporeal anyway…" She said meekly, before her face filled up with hope as she turned to Faith and Lorna, "Unless you guys have psychic powers that pack a punch?"

Lorna looked down at the ground, "Sorry, all I have is empathy. Actually, I should probably stay behind. I don't have any active powers and I don't know martial arts like Melinda and Faith, so I'm pretty much useless in a fight. I'll just get in the way…" She said sadly.

"Premonitions are about as far as my powers go, apart from jet levitation that is, but that isn't going to be much use with an incorporeal demon, so you'll need to cast the spell that makes him corporeal first before I can do any damage." Faith quickly explained, looking towards the attic door as Annabelle walked in, carrying the spell that she had copied from the book, which was still sitting in the sun room.

"That'll be Phoebe's job." Annabelle stated, walking towards the witch and handing her the spell in exchange for the satchel, "You try and stay out of harms way. Say the spell and we'll be able to take it from there, I hope." She added quietly, looking around the attic and frowning, "I take it the twins have gone to check out the area?"

Piper nodded, "Alright, we should get going. We'll distract Hades while Phoebe says the spell, and the twins will take care of the boys while all this is going on." The four of them huddled together, preparing for Annabelle to transport them to Paige's house. The eldest Charmed One gave Lorna a sympathetic look, before rejoining the circle they had made and vanishing in a swirl of particles….

* * *

"I break this bind, with this rhyme…" Paige whispered, watching as a golden glow washed over her black orb shackle, only for it to be consumed by the darkness and take away whatever effect the spell may have had in the first place, "Damnit…" She growled, setting her hands back on her knees with her huddled up position on the bed. 

Her attention was drawn to the door, where Sam and Craig stood hesitantly, looking around the hallway nervously before Sam walked briskly into the room and clambered onto the bed. The teen waved his hand over his mother's binds as his brother kept watch at the door. The black orbs dissolved into nothing, freeing Paige's hands and her personal powers. "Get out of here." Sam hissed.

Paige gave him a look of momentary shock, before stroking his face tenderly, "You're good boys…" She whispered, "I'm sorry…"

Before Sam could reply, a column of glowing water began to rise up from the floor. The fluid splashed to the ground when it reached a certain height, leaving Melinda and Emma standing in its place, "Get off!" Emma shouted, throwing out her hand towards Sam and blasting him in the back with a jet of inky darkness that flew from her palm. The umbrakinetic shot threw the boy off the bed, making him land on the floor hard. "Mom! Go! They need you downstairs!" Paige nodded wildly, before vanishing in a cloud of bright orbs that fell through the floor, heading for the downstairs.

Craig frowned darkly from the doorway, throwing his arm forward and shooting a searing stream of crimson fire at the twins. "Flames!" Emma called, holding out her hand at the attack and causing the fire to be swept up in a mass of glowing bubbles that redirected the attack at its sender. Craig disappeared in a swirl of black orbs, allowing the fire to pass through him and hit the wall and causing a large scorch mark that stained the white surface greatly.

It had begun.

* * *

Piper let out a yelp as another arrow flew into her sleeve, pinning her to the wall by her clothes. "Crap!" Before she knew it, two arrows had been shot at her ankles, going through her jeans and repeating the process that had been done with the sleeves of her blouse, "Shit!" She shouted, trying to move her hands before realizing that her pinned sleeves were holding them in place. "Phoebe, say the spell! Phoebe?" 

The eldest Charmed One frowned in confusion as it seemed that her younger sister was having a panic attack behind the couch. Phoebe was breathing heavily, looking out to the battle with a fearful glance as she watched Annabelle and Faith fight fruitlessly against the incorporeal darklighter. She let out a small scream when an energy ball zipped past her and crashed into the wall. "I can't do this…" She whispered, whimpering and curling up into a little ball, sobbing loudly.

"Phoebe! Get a grip, goddamn it!" Piper ordered, before she began to flick her hands from their stationary position, barely managing to freeze the arrow that had been heading straight for her. "Wait a minute… What the hell am I doing?" She hissed to herself in self-disgust, before taking a deep breath and becoming a flurry of fuzzy particles that easily escaped from the four arrows holding Piper's clothes to the wall. The witch became solid again, instantly dashing to the sofa and having to dive the rest of the way to avoid an energy ball.

"I can't… Piper, I can't…" Phoebe said hurriedly, shaking her head rapidly as the tears began to fall, "I don't… I just…" She buried her head in her arms, before Piper wrenched the supports away and forced her to look at her.

"Yes you can, Phoebe. You're one of the strongest people I know, you just need to get past this little glitch in your head. Just take a deep breath, and-," She was interrupted by Annabelle being thrown into the wall beside them, cracking the plaster slightly with her body and falling to the floor unconscious.

The middle Charmed One's eyes widened with terror as she looked at unconscious woman, her breathing becoming more erratic. "Mom!" Faith cried out, before there was a yelp of pain, followed by a loud crash that lasted for a few seconds. Phoebe looked up over the edge of the couch to see that her future daughter had been thrown into the bookcase. She was lying on the floor with her hair splayed over her face, blooding seeping from the back of her head.

"Faith!" Phoebe shouted, jumping to her feet with Piper to face the darklighter that had been responsible. Shoving her hand into her pocket, she wrenched out the spell that Annabelle had given her before they had come here. Paige orbed in by their side as she began to chant, looking over her sister's shoulder to see what the spell would do. "I call on spirits far and wide, bring your power to my side, pull this ghost into our plane, help us to deliver his bane."

A faint orange glow shone around the outline of Hades' body. He frowned, feeling slightly different, but gave the three witches his usual smirk, "You can't defeat me…" he growled, striding towards them and conjuring a buzzing, neon blue energy ball into his palm, preparing to launch.

"Remember what this feels like?" Piper quipped, throwing out her hands and blasting the darklighter into the wall of the living room with a shower of fiery sparks. Hades' looked up in disbelieve, standing in a slouched position from being thrown against the wall. He was wavering, still shocked at the amount of force applied to his newly corporeal body. "Paige, orb the arrow." Piper ordered, glancing to the arrow that she had frozen in the air while being pinned to the wall.

The witchlighter glanced between her enemy and the arrow, her eyes narrowing with hate, "I've got a better idea…" She growled, walking towards the arrow in stasis and plucking it out the air with her hands. Paige strode up to Hades' while he was still recovering, her face scrunching up into one of gritty determination as she plunged the arrow into the darklighter's heart.

"Paige…" He choked, blood seeping the side of his mouth as he shot an empty look in her direction.

"Love hurts…" She replied, taking a few steps back and watching as a fierce plume of scorching fire erupted from the floor and enveloped Hades. The darklighter screamed in utter agony, his head flying back in the direction of the ceiling as his flesh began to burn and sizzle. There was a final burst of heat, before an explosion took the ghost away, leaving only a small trail of smoke that dissipated through the ceiling.

"Paige, Faith needs healing…" Phoebe said softly, stroking her daughter's head as the witchlighter made her way across to her downed niece. Paige bent down, putting her hands over Faith's head and releasing a warm golden glow that began to knit up the gash in the back of her head.

Piper helped Annabelle to her feet, the mercenary let out a loud groan as she put her hand to her forehead, clearly feeling the pain of being knocked out. "Are you okay?" The eldest Charmed One asked her, earning a searing glare from the blonde for the question, "Hey, I was just asking!" She turned her attention to the stairs, where Melinda and Emma were making their way down towards the rest of them, "I take it the boys are gone?"

"Yeah, they just vanished a few seconds ago… The darklighter is gone then?" Melinda asked, putting her hands on the banister as she looked down into the living room and surveyed the scene with a blank look.

"Yeah, it's over…"

* * *

Smoke danced in the hallway of first floor. It began to writhe, as if having a form of its own before it grew in height and started to become thicker. After it a few seconds, a column of fog was in the hallway, before it faded away, leaving Hades standing there with a smirk on his face at the fact that he had managed to evade death from the Charmed Ones. "Those idiots… Just wait…" He growled. 

"Faking your own vanquish, huh?"

The darklighter jumped, turning to face who had addressed him. "I mean, couldn't you have just moved on? I would have. Especially if I knew what was about to happen to you…" Lorna said darkly. Her usual timid and kindly expression had been replaced with one of confidence and ruthlessness. Her deep blue eyes held no emotion, just an icy stare, which was in full effect, thanks to the fact that her glasses were nowhere to be seen.

"Who the hell are you?" Hades spat, looking her up and down with disdain.

Lorna rolled her eyes, "Silly demon… That doesn't even matter anymore…" She said in a low, husky voice that was far from her normal tones, "You see, out of all the Halliwells… The Charmed Ones, their kids, their husbands, and all those dead witches that came before them… They're all pretty powerful. But nothing in this world will prepare you for me…" She stared at him, giving him a dark look.

"What do you mean?"

"Let's see. We can't have you screaming and alerting everyone downstairs, so say goodbye to you mouth!" She said, waving her hand at the darklighter. "I never get tired of seeing that." She giggled, watching as Hades' eyes widened in horror at the realization that his mouth had disappeared from his face. "Bye, bye…" The redhead whispered.

Lorna's pupils suddenly expanded, enveloping the irises of her eyes and making it look as if she had two black dots in the centre of each eye. A supersonic screeching ran through the hallway as Hades' seemed to violently twitch from the noise. It got even higher pitched, before blood began to seep from the darklighter's eyes. He gave her a pleading look, before bursting into a shower of red sparks that vanished the instant they hit any surface.

Lorna's eyes returned to normal and she took a deep breath. She smirked at her handiwork, before vanishing in a swirl of light pink orbs that carried her through the ceiling and back to Manor, to where everyone else thought she was.

* * *

Piper let out a content sigh as she mixed up a cocktail. She glanced up to the stage, where the DJ was certainly earning his pay, not allowing the music to stop blasting through P3 and therefore keeping the crowd loud and entertained. "Here you go… And here you go…" She said sweetly to the couple as she put a bottle of beer onto the counter and poured the mixture that she had been making into a glass. 

"Hey, keep the change!" The man grinned, putting his arm around the waist of the woman next to him. "I'm in a generous mood." He explained, not being able to keep the smile off his face, "We just got engaged!" The man beamed, gently making the woman's hand and holding it up to Piper, showing off the ring.

"Oh! Congratulations! Well, in that case…" Piper went back to the till, opening it up and taking out the twenty dollar bill that she had deposited just before making the drinks, "… This one's on the house! Put that towards the wedding!" She smiled, putting the money back into the man's hand. "Have a nice life together!" The eldest Charmed One called out, before turning back to the till and closing it over, "Hey, stranger!" She greeted Leo as he made his way to the bar, laying his forearms down on the counter.

"Hey!" He said back, looking towards the stage, "Wow, that DJ is really working for this pay check, isn't he?" The elder commented, making his assumption from the size of the crowd. "I can't believe you had time to book that guy with all the demon stuff going on yesterday."

Piper shrugged. Moving towards him and leaning over the counter, giving him a loving peck on the lips, "Well, maybe if you weren't away up in the clouds taking care of important business all the time, you would realize that your wife is pretty damn awesome!" She smirked, glancing towards the DJ, "I'm thinking of giving him a contract offer. I mean, with all the restaurant stuff, I'm not going to be around much longer to pick out acts."

"You gonna miss not putting your life and soul into this place?" Leo asked, knowing that his wife had become extremely attached to her club in the last ten years of owning and running it.

The eldest Charmed One thought it over as she dried a glass off, "A little… But this place is pretty self-supporting now. I just need to sort out a few last details and then I take a back seat where this place is concerned. Besides, I've always wanted to open a restaurant, and I'll be able to pour my heart and soul into that even more."

"S'cuse me!" Phoebe shouted over the music, "Pregnant gal coming through! Thank you!" She smiled at the people dancing that she had interrupted before returning towards the bar and settling herself on a stool, "What's happening, people?" She asked brightly, placing her purse on the counter and grinning at her two family members.

Piper smiled in return, "Well, looks like someone found the balance where pregnant behaviour is concerned!" She commented, setting down the glass, "I guess meeting Faith put a lot of things in perspective for you, huh?"

Phoebe nodded, "Yeah. I've decided that I should just follow my instincts where the baby's concerned, as Faith's little visit has taught me that I am destined to have a beautiful, if not slightly obnoxious, daughter!" She announced, making theatrical bows when Piper pretended to clap, "Well, that and when we were sending them home this morning, Faith told me to 'chill the freaking hell out'. Yeah, apparently, having a mother that cowers behind furniture when a demon attacks isn't thought as cool."

"Really?" Piper said mockingly, "I never would have guessed. I'll tell you what _is_ cool though, knowing that we…" She glanced at Leo, "… Were able to raise Lorna to be a smart and resourceful individual that actually listens to a parent's advice, especially your little speeches, mister."

Leo's eyebrows raised in surprise, "Really? Did she mention whether or not Wyatt and Chris are as perceptive as her? Or have we just got a 'magical boys will be magical boys' situation all over again?" He asked, raising a free beer to his lips.

"Oh, I think it's definitely the latter." Piper said with an amused tone, "But we'll handle it." She assured him, kissing him softly, "I hope." The eldest Charmed One added, before Phoebe almost leapt off her bar stool with a yelp, "What wrong with you?"

"I think I just figured out why the spell summoned Faith and Lorna!" She said excitedly, "Think about it, we cast a desire spell, so on some level; we must have wanted them to be here. For example, you secretly wanted to know if you could raise someone else's child properly, and I wanted to know if my child was going to be safe. It makes perfect sense if you think about it,"

"Yeah, I'd rather not…" Piper cringed, not wanting to think about spells going awry, "So, do you think Paige will be joining us tonight?"

Phoebe looked down at the floor, "Um… I don't think so. Hades reopened some wounds for her and Aidan. He's staying in Atlantis for a couple of days until they find the courage to actually speak to one another. I think we should just give her some space… She'll be fine; she'll come to us when she wants to…"

Piper bit her lip, "I hope so…"

* * *

Paige lay on top of the covers of her bed, tears silently rolling down her porcelain face as she faced the window. Moonlight was streaming through the glass, illuminating her shaking form as she quietly sobbed into the pillow. She remembered feeling like this when Aidan had left all those years ago, the dark hole in her stomach that just seemed to devour her soul at an agonizingly slow pace. She tightened her grip around the pillow her head lay upon, gritting her teeth before she let her other arm flop off the side of the bed. 

She flinched slightly when something wet began lapping at her fingers. The witchlighter raised her head and looked over the edge of the bed to find Sandy trying to get her attention, whining softly as she nudged Paige's hand with her nose. "Hey, girl…" She said softly, "Where are your puppies? Are they sleeping?" Obviously, she didn't get an answer, "Come here…" Paige said, tapping the part of the bed next to her and making Sandy jump up.

As if she knew to comfort her owner, the dog lay down beside Paige, staying close to her to keep her warm, especially as she was not under the covers, and without her husband to keep her warm in bed. The witchlighter scratched around Sandy's neck, kissing her on the top of the head and stroking her ear. It was there it hit Paige, the reason why she had got a dog in the first place: to not be alone. It was on a night like this that that reason was existent more than ever. Snuggling closer to her pet, Paige smiled as she began to drift into sleep.

"Thank you…"


	9. Eight Legged Bitch

**Eight Legged Bitch**

Phoebe quietly sipped on her mineral water, moving the top half of her body to the music as she sat comfortably on a P3 bar stool. The middle Charmed One looked down at her watch, deciding that it was probably best for her to end the one night off she had to herself in the week. Remembering that she had already paid for the drink, she slid off her stool and grabbed her purse, making her way through the crowd as they moved to the music and heading for the stairway that led to the exit.

The middle Charmed One raised her hand to her mouth as she yawned, before someone suddenly bumped into her. She turned her head to see who was, before letting out a loud gasp of air as she was flung into a premonition. To the people dancing around her, her stall only lasted for a second, but in that second, Phoebe witnessed something that she had to use to save a man's life. Her eyes flashed open, instantly looking around for the person that she had seen her vision, "Wait!" She shouted, running towards the stairs as she saw him vanish up the steps.

She ran out of the club, ignoring the odd looks she was getting from people that were flooding into the establishment. The witch looked around, hoping that she would be able to see the scene where her premonition had taken place. She thought hard, thinking that the place had looked familiar, before realizing that she had seen the act take place in the alley behind P3.

Running as fast as her high heels and three month pregnant body would allow, Phoebe bolted to the side of the club, heading for the alleyway and bent on stopping the tragedy that she had foresaw.

He pressed her up against the wall, grinning inanely before pressing his lips hard against hers. The dark haired girl moaned into the kiss, allowing her lover to take complete control as he pinned her to the wall by her slamming her wrists against it. Their lips broke apart and the girl began to kiss his neck. He moaned in ecstasy, before his brow furrowed in discomfort. "Ah… Stop." He whimpered, before letting out a scream of pain as blood began to trickle down his neck.

The girl pulled back instantly after making the bite, letting the man drop to the ground as her teeth returned to their normal size. She wiped the blood away, grimacing at its taste. "I hate that part…" She said absentmindedly, crouching down to watch as the colour from the man's face drained very quickly, before his head flopped to the side. He was dead.

Phoebe ran into the alley, short of breath. She looked from left to right, before spotting the girl crouching over the man's body. "Hey!" She bellowed, hoping she could take care of the threat in time to see if the man could be saved from whatever had caused him to collapse in the first place.

The girl stood up, glaring at the advancing witch with a heated glare and hurling out her hand as a shimmering stream of string flew from her wrist. It came towards Phoebe at such a speed that she barely had time to completely body swerve the attack. As it passed by, the middle Charmed One saw that it was sticky. A web?

But before she could even think on the matter further, the girl leapt for the wall, her hands and feet sticking to it easily as she scuttled towards Phoebe at lightning speed. She moved with a flat posture, making the middle Charmed One a little nervous from unusualness of her movements. The pale woman jumped from the wall, landing in front of Phoebe and throwing the back of her hand across her cheek.

The witch let out a yelp, putting her hand to her lip, before a white globe of psionic light gathered above her eyes and she looked up. She fired the mental blast at her enemy's head and sent her flying to the other side of the alley, where she crashed into the side of a dumpster with a loud clanging noise.

Phoebe took a fighting stance, preparing herself for going hand to hand with this creature. She watched as the girl recovered from her attack, glaring at Phoebe with sheer hatred before she lunged at the wall, climbing up and onto the building's roof with unnatural speed and disappearing into the night.

There was a creak from the door of P3 as a bartender came out with a black bag of trash, heading towards the dumpster. He made a casual glance towards the scene, before he realized what he was seeing and his eyes widened with horror. The bag dropped from his hand, making trash spill out onto the ground as he put a hand to his mouth, "My God…"

"Call 911!"

* * *

Piper sat at a newly installed stainless steel counter that was now part of her restaurant's kitchen. She scribbled down a few numbers onto the spreadsheet in front of her, inputting information into the calculator next to her and smiling at whatever had came up on the screen. "I love it when the numbers add up!" She exclaimed gleefully, going back to writing with a large grin on her face, before her cell phone began to ring. The eldest Charmed One let out a groan as she looked at the name on the screen and flipping it open, answering the call, "I'm going out on a limb here, and saying that you're calling to fill me in on the debacle at P3 last night?"

"Oh…" Phoebe cringed, beginning to twirl the phone's chord around her finger even faster as she hesitated, "So you heard about that, huh?" She asked uncertainly, "I was hoping I'd get to you first before anyone else. How did you find out anyway?" She frowned, ceasing to twirl the chord around her finger and going back to typing on her office computer.

"Phoebe, I own the club. When someone is killed on my property, I'm sorta essential in the investigating process." Piper explained with a monotonous tone, "Anyway, I'm not really that bothered with the cops. Were you hurt when you fought whatever killed the guy?" She asked, going back to her spreadsheets.

Phoebe grimaced as she touched the small cut on her lip, "Um… Yeah, but I've experienced worse bitch slaps, so I'm alright." She frowned with confusion, "Hey, how'd did you know I fought something? I didn't tell the cops that."

Piper rolled her eyes, "Oh, come on, Phoebe. The excuse where you say that you just found the dead body has been used so many times by the three of us that'd it be easier just to put it on our answering machines…" She groaned, sliding her laptop towards her, "So, did you get an idea of what kind of demon it was?"

"Actually, I'm not even sure if she was a demon, because as soon as I made it clear that I had powers, she climbed up the nearest wall and ran off. But I don't know, maybe its different breed of Spider Demon or something. The way she could stick to walls and throw webs…" Phoebe explained, "Um… Piper, I gotta go. I called Paige and told her to meet us at your house at lunch, it that okay?"

"Yeah, sure, I've gotta jet right now anyway…" The eldest replied, her eyes fixed on the door of the kitchen as Aidan walked in, "Okay, I'll see you guys at lunch. You might want to call Annabelle at the house and get her to look in the book before we get there. See ya." She brought the cell phone down from her ear, flipping it closed and laying it down on the spotless counter, "Lemme guess… A water elemental in a kitchen… You're here to clean?" Piper suggested with a toothy grin.

Aidan chuckled slightly, smiling as he laid his hands on the counter's opposite side, "Actually, I was wondering if you could help me out with Paige…" He was about to continue, when Piper let out a groan and her head fell to the table dramatically, "Okay, before you give me that reaction, I'm not here to ask for ways to get back into her good books… I just want your advice on planning a night where we can sit down, talk things out calmly, and hopefully resolve everything."

"You want my advice? You never should have stopped trusting your damn wife. Because God knows she didn't do anything to warrant the way you treated her with the whole Hades thing." She rolled her eyes when Aidan made a visible flinch at the name, "Look, Aidan, seriously, he's gone for good now. Paige personally saw to that, trust me. So get over it." She pressed a few keys on her laptop, pouting her lips, "And you still haven't really given me a reason for why I should help you…"

Aidan's eyebrows rose in surprise, before he began to pace in circles and hold his hand to his forehead, "Alright, you want a few reasons? I'll give you some. I am sick of sleeping on the couch, I am sick of getting the cold shoulder, I am sick of Paige being angry at me, and most of all, I am sick of the fact that we are supposed to be enjoying the start of the rest of our lives together, and yet we're living in silence." He placed his hands back on the counter, "So, are you gonna help me or not?"

Piper grinned, making a clicking noise with her tongue as she typed furiously into the laptop, "Now, you see, that sounds like a man who wants his wife back!" She said passionately, pushing the computer away from herself and giving Aidan her full attention, clasping her hands over the counter, "Alright, here's what you do. Paige? She's really good at the cold shoulder, but she will be willing to air out your problems. Take her to dinner, so she won't start shouting and cause a scene. Oh! Dancing! Oh, you have to take her take her dancing! And then you walk home along the pier, listening to sound of the ocean… God, I miss having fun!" She wailed, pouting slightly.

"Um… The dancing part I should probably miss out, but the other two things sound like a good idea… Thanks, Piper!" He said cheerily, turning on his heel and heading towards the door that led out into the still empty main area of the restaurant.

"Don't thank me yet!" Piper shouted back, before saying something else in a low tone so her brother in law wouldn't be able to hear her. "She might just slap you for the umpteenth time in your relationship…"

* * *

Paige dipped her fingers into the bowl of powdered toadstool as she took a pinch of the grainy substance, throwing it into the sizzling pot and bouncing her head to the tune that she was mentally singing. As if it was by routine, she took a small pin from the edge of the kitchen counter and pushed it into her index finger. The witchlighter held her now bleeding finger over the pot and let a few drops of her blood fall into the cauldron. "Wow… That didn't even hurt this time."

"Hey." Piper greeted as she walked into the kitchen, taking off her jacket and slinging it over one of chairs at the table, "What are making?" The eldest Charmed One asked, peering into the cauldron before looking towards the open Book of Shadows, "The Spider Demon vanquishing potion, huh? I take it you heard Phoebe's theory?"

Paige nodded, "Yeah, and I figure even if it isn't a Spider Demon, this potion should still have some effect against whatever the hell the thing is." She picked up a clean needle from the counter after throwing hers into the trash, "Here, I've already blessed it, now it's your turn. Where's Phoebe?"

"She's on her way, I think. Who let you in?"

"Annabelle. I think she's gone to comb the alleyway for anything that we could scry with, you know, stuff the cops might have missed when they were looking over the place." Paige quickly explained, "Although I told her she didn't have to, because I got in touch with Darryl and he was able to get me hair that they found at the scene, and…" She left the potion, going towards the table and shoving her hand into her purse before revealing a pale yellow folder, "Ta da! Coroner's report."

Piper raised her eyebrows in surprise, "Wow, you really seem to be getting into this…" She said casually, rubbing the counter nervously, "So, does it confirm or deny anything from Phoebe's theories?"

"Well, yes and no. They guy was killed by a poisonous spider bite; it says here it was a Black Widow. But then I remembered that Spider Demons don't kill their prey, they feed off them for a century, and their prey is magical, not just some horny mortal…" She droned with a roll of her eyes, clearly not thinking much of the man that had been murdered.

Piper narrowed her eyes at her youngest sister, "Now, was that bitterness about the guy in particular? Or just the male species in general?" She asked wistfully, "Aidan came by the restaurant this morning; he's pretty pissed at himself for how he reacted with the Hades situation. He wants to fix things."

"Good for him." Paige stonily replied, her eyes boring into the paper in the report as if it would burst into flames with just her glare. "… What else was he saying?" She asked quietly, lowering the folder down to the table and trying to hide her interest in the matter.

"That he was sorry, that he wants to air out all your problems, and that you guys should be enjoying your time together. I definitely agree with the last bit. The second bit? Not so much. I've seen how… passionate you can get when it comes to arguments…" They stayed in a small silence for a moment, "Are you going to give him a chance?"

Paige sighed, pulling her top lip into her mouth as she thought, "He called me at work this morning, presumably after talking to you, wanting to set up something tonight. I guess I'll know if things are gonna work out by the end of today, huh?" She said with a bittersweet smile, putting her hands on her knees and tapping her fingers.

"Yeah…" Piper replied softly.

"Hello?" Phoebe's voice boomed from the other room, along with the creak from the front door as she entered, "Where is everyone?"

"In here!" Piper shouted back, turning to the kitchen entrance as Phoebe walked in, pulling her purse down from her shoulder and holding it in front of her knees, "What took you so long to get here?"

"Oh, Elise caught me just as I was leaving, asking me to fix a little typo on my column, then my computer crashed…" She waved her hand, signaling that it was nothing to worry about, "Anyway, how goes everything here?" She asked brightly, before the needle that Piper had been nervously fumbling with was thrust into her hand, "What's this for?"

"Blessing the potion, it requires all three of us to give it our blood. Hop to it." Piper ordered, smiling as Phoebe made her way to potion and cringed as she prodded her finger with the needle, "Okay, you start scrying for the demon, then I'll bless this potion and go with Annabelle to check it out."

"Uh, excuse me, but why are Paige and I not allowed to go?" Phoebe said, her voice thick with offense as she questioned her older sister, "Ow! Son of a…" She growled as the pin finally pierced her skin, letting blood flow from the small hole in her finger and into the pot.

Piper turned around, giving Phoebe a look, "I think you know why you're not going, and Paige needs to stay here and whip up a batch of her extra powerful hand grenade potions incase this vanquishing potion turns out to be useless against this chick. She quickly explained, "Oh, and I asked Leo to go Up There and ask about there being different breeds of Spider Demon. If you hear from him, get him to come after us."

"'Whip up a batch'? You make it sound like I'm baking cookies, although that would be an interesting vanquish. Death by cookie... Oh! A vanquishing cookie, I should totally make one of those." Paige absentmindedly mused as she grabbed the plastic evidence bag that the hair was in, placing it in her hand with the scrying crystal string and beginning to spin the amethyst across the map.

"Alright then!" Piper announced, turning around and pushing a fresh pin into her finger, holding it out over the potion pot and allowing a drop of her blood to join with her sisters' blood and the rest of the concoction. There was a loud boom as a white cloud of mushroom smoke flew from the pot, "Let's squash this bug."

* * *

Annabelle walked through the hazy wall, feeling strange as she wasn't used to the sensation of walking through a phased object. Piper followed quickly after her, ducking in through the obstruction, removing her hand off the outside and returning the wall to its solid state. The two women scrunched up their eyes, their sight being affected by the sudden darkness they were hit with.

"Why the hell is it pitch black in here? It's sunny and bright outside. There should be some light coming through the windows…" Annabelle mused, pawing on the wall next to the door and looking for a light switch, before her hands fell upon the mechanism and she flicked it on, bathing the apartment in a soft glow from the light bulb in the centre of the room, "Well, that explains it…"

The entire room was covered in thick cobwebs, stretching from the corner of a dusty coffee table to the floor, along with the corners of the ceiling, which where heavily covered in the silky thread. It looked as if the walls each had a coating of the webs as well, but it seemed to be at its thickest around a rectangular shape on the east wall from where the two of them were standing, "How much are you betting that there's a window behind that?" Piper asked with a dry tone. "Okay, I'll check the bedroom; you have a look around here." The two women split up, Annabelle headed for the open plan kitchen, while Piper went towards the open door on the other side of the living room, where the edge of a bed was just visible on the inside.

Piper cautiously approached the darkened space, turning around and watching her friend disappear into the bathroom to check it out. She slowly felt around the wall for a light switch, before noticing a string dangling from the ceiling. The witch pulled on it, illuminating the room in the same cold fluorescent light that was in the living room. It was in just the same state, thick cobwebs hung from every place possible, making the entire apartment look like a giant spider's nest. Piper took her first steps in, looking around and frowning when she saw nothing. She eyed a large wardrobe on the other side of room, glaring at it suspiciously before raising her hands at lightning speed and blowing it up, reducing it to a shower of splinters and wood shafts in seconds with a loud boom.

"Piper, you okay?" Annabelle's voice shouted uncertainly from the bathroom.

"Yeah, false alarm…" She called back, all the while unaware that the girl she was looking for had been on the ceiling this entire time.

Without any warning, she dropped onto Piper silently, knocking the witch out with a powerful blow to the head and making her fall onto the web covered bed. The pale girl turned the witch over so she could see her face. She frowned, clearly thinking that it had been the same witch that had seen her last night. Smirking, she dug a fingernail into her opposite palm and dragged it across, leaving a bleeding cut. She licked her finger clean of the blood, before repeating the process with Piper, except leaving the small cut in her neck, which she then pressed her wounded hand against. "You'll join me soon enough…" She whispered.

"Hey, Piper, I think found…" Annabelle looked up from the folder she was carrying, taking in the scene around her before closing over the folder, "… Something…" She finished her sentence, before launching a high powered energy ball in the girl's direction. The attacker elegantly dodged, flipping off the bed and to the left, leaving the neon blue sphere to crash into the headboard. The blonde noticed the vanquishing potion in Piper's hand, and made a lunge for it, grabbing the vial from her friend's unconscious form and hurling it at her enemy's feet, but the only thing the concoction succeeded in doing was smashing to the floor and leaving a dark blue stain on the webby carpet.

Deciding to not to take her chances with the mercenary any further, the dark haired girl flung her hands out towards a part of the opposite that was heavily covered in web. The two strings that shot from her wrist latched onto each side of the area, before she grabbed onto the string and pulled. There was a loud crack as the plaster and brick began to tear apart, before there was a thundering crash the window was wrenched from the wall, flooding the bedroom with natural light as the sun filtered in.

She leapt over the bed, standing at the edge of the hole in the room and looking down the nine stories that her apartment sat upon. She shot Annabelle a grin, before throwing another thread of web out towards the street and jumping out of the building, swinging down the street and vanishing around the corner just as Annabelle managed to make it to makeshift exit, watching as their attacker swung into the city.

* * *

Piper let out a sigh as she ran the cloth under the warm water coming from the tap in the kitchen. She pressed it against her wound, wincing as the moist cloth began to work against the cut. Leo reached out his hand, going for his wife's neck, before it was lightly slapped away, "Oh, don't bother, it's just a scratch. We may need your healing powers later if that bitch gets another victim, so save your energy."

"You should have waited until I got back from the Elders. I would have gone with you and made sure that this didn't happen." The elder said, his brow furrowing in concern for his wife, "I wonder why she didn't just kill you. I mean, you were knocked out, no way to defend yourself or to get Annabelle's attention, she could have done it easily." Leo argued. Piper merely shrugged, taking the cloth away from her neck and rinsing with the warm water once more.

Annabelle looked up from the kitchen table, where she was reading the file that she had taken from the apartment. She looked towards Phoebe and Paige, who were making a pot of explosion potions. She frowned when she noticed that Phoebe was looking at Piper's back with her eyes narrowed, "Actually, I think she was about to kill her. It was just by chance that I came in when I did. I wanted to show Piper this…" She announced, standing up and placing the folder down on the kitchen island, "She's a mutant. Sharon Webster, arachnid feral, age twenty-five. It's all here in her file, which I'm not even sure how she got a hold of."

Phoebe frowned as she grabbed the file. As she had the most knowledge of mutants, it was only right that she should be the one to look it over, "Well, that explains why the vanquishing potion did absolute jack. She's not a demon. Hell, she's only magical through some genetic disaster… Although, I'm hardly one to talk…" She murmured, thinking of her own Genomex file that was under her mattress at home.

"Okay, so she's basically a human. We can't vanquish her then?" Paige inquired, placing another filled up vial next to the stock that she was compiling on the kitchen counter top. "Should I even bother filling the rest of those vials?" She asked, gesturing to the empty potion bottles next to the sink.

Annabelle nodded, "Yeah, she's an unstable mutant; your powers might not be very effective against her. Phoebe just got lucky with her psionic blast last night, Sharon wasn't expecting it. Mutants have a little bit of immunity to witch's powers, just like normal witches do." The blonde's eyes widened at the curious stares she got from the two witches, "I've dealt with mutants in the past. Separate subject." She warned clearly, "You'll need to bind or strip her powers somehow…"

"Wait a minute, I fought mutants for a year and my powers worked at their usual level every time." Phoebe argued, grabbing a few of the potion vials and clutching to them in her palms as she prepared to defend herself.

"Yeah, but like you said, you're a mutant. That probably factored into the whole process somehow. Trust me, I've seen many a witch die at the hands of a mutant, I don't want you guys to join that number." Annabelle warned, taking some of the vials for herself.

Piper took Leo's hand in hers, giving her sisters an empty stare, "Leo and I will go and get the binding potion from the book. The walk will do us good; I can shake off the groggy feeling of this cut…" She said huskily, giving her husband a smoldering look before dragging him out of the kitchen, none of the people in the room how her eyes had dilated.

"What's up with her?" Paige asked, cringing at the sight she had just witnessed. Out of all the people the witchlighter knew, Piper was one of the most conservative. She wasn't one to flaunt or make her personal live public.

"I dunno…" Phoebe replied uncertainly, going towards the sink to clean up the bloodied cloth that Piper had left next to the sink, "But there's something…" She said darkly, picking up the cloth. She barely had time to catch a breath as she was thrown into a premonition, images of the past flooding her mind and beginning to make sense of things that were happening in the present.

_Without any warning, she dropped onto Piper silently, knocking the witch out with a powerful blow to the head and making her fall onto the web covered bed. The pale girl turned the witch over so she could see her face. She frowned, clearly thinking that it had been the same witch that had seen her last night. Smirking, she dug a fingernail into her opposite palm and dragged it across, leaving a bleeding cut. She licked her finger clean of the blood, before repeating the process with Piper, except leaving the small cut in her neck, which she then pressed her wounded hand against. "You'll join me soon enough…" She whispered._

Phoebe's eyes flashed open as her vision ended. She dropped the cloth into the sink, leaving it to dampen under the still running tap. Gathering herself, she turned off the water and made her way to her sister, grabbing her hand roughly, "Attic, orb, now." She demanded. Paige, having known her sister long enough to recognize a premonition, did what she was told and carried them through the ceiling in cloud of blue and white twinkling lights.

"Hey, wait for me!" Annabelle protested, shouting at the ceiling before bursting into a column of molecules that wavered for a moment before flying up and through the ceiling.

* * *

Piper dove in for another fierce kiss, her lips crashing with Leo's roughly as she straddled his waist on the attic sofa, running her hands through his short blonde hair as she kissed him. She began to pull at his shirt, never once breaking the intense lip lock as she pulled it apart, the buttons popping apart one by one. Leo let out a moan in protest as he pushed her away, licking his lips, "What's the matter?" Piper asked darkly, her hair hanging over one side of her face and neck, "Don't you want me?" She asked with a hurt tone, dragging a fingernail down her husband's cotton undershirt.

Leo looked his wife up and down, "No… It's not that, trust me…" He replied, biting his lip, "But we came up here to get the binding potion, and Phoebe and Paige are probably going to start wondering what's taking so long." The elder explained, moving his hands up and down Piper's sides. He raised his hand to her face, gently brushing her hair back to her shoulders, "Piper, your neck!" He exclaimed, looking horrified at the dark green lines now spreading from her wound.

"That's the least of your problems…" She growled, opening up her mouth and revealing that her front teeth had grown into deadly sharp fangs. The witch clamped her hands around Leo's shoulders and dove for his neck, intending to infect him with the deadly poison which now dripped from her teeth.

Orbs and particles began to flow into the room, quickly taking the form of the three women that had come from the kitchen moments ago. Annabelle threw out her hand, firing a low voltage energy ball into Piper's side, causing her to lose her balance and fall from her position over her husband. Leo looked up from the sofa, quickly buttoning up his shirt and standing. "We need to heal her neck!" He shouted.

"Oh, you want to try and get that close to those fangs?" Paige spat, throwing out her arm across her chest and telekinetically throwing Piper across the room, making her land and crash right through a recently repaired dresser, which was reduced to a pile of splinters in Piper's wake as she fell through the old piece of furniture. "Crystals, circ-!"

The witchlighter didn't get to finish her command, as the window suddenly caved in with a loud smash. The group looked over to the source of the noise, only to find that Sharon was in the attic. She sat in a crouched position as she recovered from her acrobatic maneuver. She looked up, smiling as Piper got to her feet, "I knew it wouldn't take that long for my blood to get you…" She grinned, revealing that she too had elongated teeth. "Let's blow this joint." Sharon suggested, earning an approving look from Piper.

"Be right with you…" The eldest Charmed One smirked. She suddenly threw out her hands, silky string flying from her wrists and flying straight for Leo. With amazing precision, the webs collided with the elder's hands, throwing him back against the wall and pinning him to the same spot by sticking his hands to the wall. "You missed out on a good time.' She growled to Leo.

"Oh no you don't!" Phoebe suddenly warned, striding towards Piper and spinning her right leg, raising her left into a roundhouse kick that was caught by her older sister thanks to her enhanced reflexes. Piper threw her leg back down to the ground, raising her fist towards Phoebe's face, only to have the middle Charmed One grab her wrist and twist it violently, using the window of momentary pain to land a kick into her stomach.

"I am really getting sick of those kicks…" She growled, hurling her hands towards the ground and encasing Phoebe's feet in a thick layer of cobwebs that flew from her wrists, ensnaring the witch and rendering her unable to move. "Let's see you get me now…" Piper grinned, before a psionic blast collided with her head, causing her to stumble back in surprise from the low power mental attack.

"That was just a warning." Phoebe snapped, "Paige! Trap them both and we'll figure this out."

But before the witchlighter could make a move, she was hit by an explosive blast that had flown from Piper's hands. She felt the geokinetic gravitational force from her older sister's power pin her to the attic's slanted ceiling, before both Piper and Sharon threw out their hands and covered her hands and feet in thick webs, sticking her to the ceiling. "For God's sake, Piper!" Paige exclaimed, wriggling fruitlessly as she tried to dislodge herself.

Annabelle spun around, facing the two women who were still free. She held out her hand, conjuring a sizzling bright blue energy ball into her palm, "Alright… You've spun your last web, bi-," Her words were suddenly cut off by gasp of pain, "No!" She growled, ripping off her glove to reveal that her phoenix tattoo was burning with a searing hot light that seemed to be spreading pain through her entire body. "Not now… Please, not now…" She whispered as she fell to her knees, clutching her head and curling up into a ball before collapsing to the floor unconscious.

"Let's get out of here." Sharon advised, running towards the smashed window and throwing her hand out towards a target in the street. A web flew from her wrist, latching to something couldn't be seen, before the arachnid feral gripped it tightly and swung out of the window. Piper quickly followed suit, showing just how in control she was of her new powers as she jumped from the window and fled the scene.

Paige rolled her eyes from her position on the ceiling, letting out a groan as her head drooped to her chest, defeated. "Next time, we're _so_ using Raid…"

* * *

Paige let out a sigh as she lowered the crystal over the map, beginning to swivel her wrist and spin the lilac gem across the layout of San Francisco. She kept the momentum going for a few moments, before letting out a groan, "I'm getting nothing…" She stated, halting the crystal and bringing it back up into her hand, "They're probably dodging Spiderman's lawyers underground." The witchlighter rolled her eyes and laid a hand on her hip, leaning against the table, "What the hell happened to her?" She asked, nodding towards Annabelle, who was still unconscious on the couch.

"I dunno…" Leo replied gruffly, stumped at what was causing his former charge's condition, "My healing powers aren't working. I'm think it has something to do with the tattoo on her wrist. Did you see how bright it was? It looked painful, probably enough to render her unconscious." He explained, looking down at the blonde on the couch, "She'll be fine, we should focus on getting Piper back."

Phoebe raised a skeptical eyebrow as she flipped through the pages of the Book of Shadows, "Well, our original binding potion idea won't work. Piper's been infected now too, so if we bound her powers, she'd be left with nothing." She clasped her hands and placed them delicately on the book, "Also, Piper's body hasn't had the genetic alterations to handle mutations. That blood is probably killing her as we speak."

"Great, so we're clueless _and_ against the clock?" Paige asked rhetorically, turning back to the map, "Things just keep getting better and better…" She shook her head in disgust, holding the crystal out once again, "I can't believe she pinned us to the wall for five hours! If we had been up there a minute longer I would have lost my dignity, if you know what I mean…"

Phoebe cringed, "Paige, that's disgusting!" She exclaimed, before pursing her lips and raising her eyebrows, "Thank God you called for Aidan, or we may have never got down," She casually mentioned, looking for Paige's reaction, "And the way you guys used your collective powers to free Leo and I? Me and Brennan could never pull something off like that… You guys are a great team to be able to-,"

"Oh God, please stop. Aidan was basically the only person we call could call. Anna was on the floor, Pam's in New York, Brennan's away saving lives, and Piper's gone AWOL. Unless we had a fifth sister stashed away somewhere who could have helped us, we needed him." Paige snapped, going back to scrying with a sigh as she gripped her hip tightly in anger with her free hand.

"Okay, that's all the kids occupied. Wyatt's keeping an eye on them until we can figure this all out." Aidan announced as he came into the attic, "Have you guys got a plan yet? Because you really should-"

"No. We don't have a plan" Paige spat, keeping her eyes fixed on the map, all the while not realizing that she was beginning to spin the crystal much too fast. "So, if you don't have any suggestions just leave us to it and don't criticize our methods!" The string flew out her hand, sending the crystal across the room before skidding along the floor at Leo's feet, "Shit…"

Phoebe looked between the warring couple for a few seconds, "Um… Leo, why don't we go and check on the kids? You can't do anything for Annabelle, so let's just let her recover by herself." She quietly suggested, walking towards her brother in law and picking up the scrying crystal, handing it back to Paige, "We'll leave you two to talk."

"Pheebs, if you're going downstairs, bring me the rag Piper was using to clean her cut with." Paige asked, putting down her recently retrieved crystal and walking towards the Book of Shadows, beginning to look through the tome, "I think I have a plan…" She said lowly, now keeping her sight transfixed on the page in front of her.

Phoebe nodded, "Okay, we'll be back in five." She smiled, before heading out towards the door with Leo in tow.

"It looks like we're not going to make it to dinner." Aidan hesitantly began, moving towards the Book of Shadows, "And I don't think Phoebe's hints come any bigger than what she just did, so…" He put his hands into his pockets, before rolling his eyes, "Are you going to talk to me, or bury your head in that book?"

The witchlighter let out a sigh and looked up, "I'm not talking because you'll hate what I say… I called Pam earlier, and she said that it's okay if I go and stay with her for a couple of days." She said quietly, not waiting for a reaction before continuing, "Right now, we're both in a place where everything is up in the air. If we get away from each other for a while, we can think things out for ourselves and hopefully make a decision when I get back." Paige bit her lip and looked back down, "And for the record, I'm not doing this to get away… I want to fix this more than anything right now…"

"Okay…" He meekly replied, letting the two of them stand in uncomfortable silence for a few seconds, the only sound being the rustling of pages as Paige looked through the Book of Shadows.

The clomping of Phoebe's shoes soon broke through the air as she and Leo strode into the attic. The witch held up the bloodied cloth that she had been sent to get, smiling as she held it up at her younger sister, "Is this what you were looking for?" She smirked, making sure to hold the cloth so her fingers were well away from the blood itself.

"Um… Yeah…" Paige replied, her voice cracking a little before she cleared her throat. She walked over to Phoebe, taking the cloth before going back to the book, "I think we may be able to use this to summon Sharon and Piper." She explained, before going into more depth when she saw the confused look on her sister's face, "Piper's blood was contaminated with Sharon's, right? So both their blood is on this. We summon them here and fix around their powers, knock out Sharon, and heal Piper's wound."

Phoebe frowned, "Fix their powers?" She asked, before smiling in realization, "Oh… They're sharing powers through the blood mix, so if we set their powers straight again, Piper will be back to normal so she won't resist healing. Do you think a tweaked power switching spell would do the trick?"

"Yeah, but our only problem is what we do with Sharon afterwards. We can't let her have her abilities after this. I mean, do we turn her in to the cops? We don't exactly have proof that she did anything, and we had to fry that security tape from last night because it had you firing light from your head…" Paige's eyes suddenly sparkled as a plan formed in her head, "I've got it! It's safe, it's quick, and…" She began to form a smirk, "It's humane."

* * *

"You seem to live such a drab little life…" Sharon absentmindedly commented as she laid her arms down on the counter of the club they were in, "You work, you mother your children, you love your husband… It all seems pretty boring and normal to me." She smirked, downing her seventh shot glass of the evening and using her heightened alcohol limit to her advantage, "Well, sweetie, all that's about to change. I'm gonna show you a good time, no more being chained to the home for you."

Piper rolled her eyes, fidgeting by softly running her index finger around the rim of her glass, "I guess when you live the some sort of life for twelve years, you fall into a routine and don't realize that you've become a crashing bore. I wanna have fun." She looked towards Sharon, "And something tells me I'm gonna find it. Although certainly not in the arms of a husband who seems to have settled with whom I've become."

"Okay, enough of the boring therapist talk; you need a bite to eat." The arachnid feral looked out towards a dance floor that was much larger than P3's, "He's cute." She pointed to a young dark haired man who looked to be in his early twenties, "Tasty…" She licked her lips, "He's looks like he won't put up much of a fight either, perfect for your first one."

The eldest Charmed One's gaze darkened into a seductive stare. She let out a groan as she threw her head back, making her long hair flow down her back, "With pleasure…" She murmured, beginning to walk towards her prey before Sharon grimaced and held her hand to her stomach, "What is it? What's wrong?"

The dark haired woman bared her teeth, "A damn technicality." She growled, "Doesn't matter anyway, at least pregnancies for spiders are a whole lot shorter than humans… Too bad I get all the mortal symptoms coming at me hard and fast." She turned towards the bathroom, "Come on, I need to throw up, and you're not taking your first mark without supervision. We can't have you getting caught now, can we?"

Giving her target a disappointed look, Piper turned on her heel and followed Sharon towards the bathroom, not even noticing that a small spiral of sparkling white lights was beginning to lap around her feet, all the while growing in height and size.

* * *

"Power of the witches rise, course unseen across the skies, come to us who call you near, come to us and settle here, blood to blood we summon thee…" Phoebe and Paige continued the spell to call a lost witch, before dropping the bloodied cloth into the smoking copper pot, causing a large mushroom cloud of smoke to rise up from the concoction with a loud boom, "Blood to blood return to me." The two of them shared a hesitant glance for a moment after the spell didn't seem to have any effect. Leo and Aidan watched on, they too wondering if the spell had worked.

Their fears were soon quashed however, as two spirals of shining white lights spun around the centre of the room, summoning the two people that had been specified by the blood on the cloth. The tornados of bright spheres spun faster and faster before weakening and vanishing abruptly into the air, leaving both Piper and Sharon standing in the attic with confused looks on their faces. "How did you get down?" Piper spat at Paige, looking at her with contempt.

"Piper, let me heal you." Leo said softly, advancing on his wife with his hand rose. The elder was prepared for Piper's potentially violent behaviour, bending backwards when she tried to slash him with her enlarged nails. "You're dying!" He protested, grabbing her wrist as she tried to bring her hand to his face. The eldest Charmed One returned his concern by throwing the back of her free hand across his cheek and hurling him into a pile of cardboard boxes that inhabited one of the attic's corners.

Paige threw out her arm, trying to telekinetically throw Sharon across the room and into the recently repaired dresser, but she was only able to make the mutant stumble heavily backwards and almost fall to the floor, "Damn, that stupid mutant immunity thing!" She hissed, looking towards her husband for help, "Aidan, do something! Our powers won't work!"

Getting up from his crouch position over Leo, Aidan stood up and threw out his hand, sending a wave of concentrated water pressure at the feral that hit her in the stomach, hurling her through the air before she crashed against the slanted ceiling, hitting against Phoebe's old bike that was still suspended on the side of the room. The bike fell on top of her as she came down to the floor, knocking her out as one of the handles hit her roughly on the back of her head.

"What's hers is yours, what's yours is hers, let your powers across the line, you've offered up your gifts to share, now switch them back through the air!" Phoebe chanted from the recently written down spell that was on the piece of paper in her hand, "C'mon, please work…"

Piper bared her enlarged teeth as she ran at her two sisters, but she suddenly stopped and swayed slightly on the spot, her mouth still open to reveal that her teeth were going back to their normal size, along with the sharper nails that she had recently acquired from her transformation. The colour that had been drained from her face slowly began to return, but was still not back to normal, "I don't feel so good…" She groaned, before falling to the floor, revealing that the cut on her neck was even worse from earlier that day, the dark green lines almost spreading out to her ear and the side of her face.

"Okay, next stage of plan. I sure hope this works, Paige." Phoebe said doubtfully, ripping off the top piece of paper on her pad and scanning the spell that she had written down before summoning the two women. "Because if it doesn't…"

"It will!" Paige protested, grabbing her sister's hand and dragging her towards the unconscious form of Sharon, "Just trust me, alright?"

"We'll take of Piper." Aidan informed them, helping Leo to his feet before the elder noticed his wife collapsed on the ground. He rushed towards her, falling back to his knees and applying a soft healing glow to the infected wound on the eldest Charmed One's neck.

Phoebe took a breath, giving her sister one last look of skepticism before reciting the spell, "Something wicked in our midst, in this home where she exists, in human form this spirit does dwell, make her an animal sayth the spell."

A white glow quickly enveloped Sharon that began to shrink, the bike on top of her shifting with her form, getting closer and closer to the ground as the person underneath it decreased in size. After a few seconds, all that was left was a relatively small glow on the floor, before it disappeared, leaving a rather large tarantula-like spider in its place. The creature was laying its back, knocked out, just like its human alter ego.

"Okay, get her out of here before Piper wakes up, you know how spiders freak her out." Phoebe advised, lightly hitting Paige on the arm until she relented and hit her sister's hand away out of annoyance.

"Natural habitat!" The witchlighter ordered, gesturing towards the spider on the ground. The creature was swallowed in a small cloud of white and blue lights that twinkled on the spot for a moment before vanishing completely, taking the animal with it. Pleased with herself, Paige turned around to gloat, seeing that eldest sister was now conscious, "I'm sure she'll live a perfectly happy spider-y life, aren't you?" She smirked.

Piper groaned as she raised a hand to her head, "My God, my head is banging… Why is so bright in here?" She questioned weakly, shielding her eyes from the bright light coming from the chandelier in the centre of the room, "What the hell is going on?" The witch breathed out, leaning against Leo, who was still kneeling by her side.

"Um…" Leo hesitated, soothingly rubbing his wife's back before kissing her temple, "You bugged out a little."

* * *

"Hey." Phoebe greeted Piper brightly as she walked through the vast expanse of empty space that was her restaurant. She glared at her sister, who was sitting at the newly installed bar, still scribbling on spreadsheets and working herself to the bone, "Please do not say that you've been working on those damn things all morning. Piper, you need to take your heads out the books eventually!"

Piper rolled her eyes in response, calmly putting down her pen, "Phoebe, gimme a break, alright? I would have got all this done yesterday afternoon if I hadn't been busy slinging webs and flying through the city. I'm still surprised it's not in your paper." She said, rummaging through the paperwork on the bar to retrieve a copy of the Bay Mirror, "I'm guessing you had something to do with that, right?"

"Well, I may have wiped a few memories, but I was just cleaning up your mess. And that is why lunch is on you today." The middle Charmed One smirked craftily before the glee vanished from her face, "Paige left with the girls for New York this morning… Pam's under strict orders to help her, and not just to take her sightseeing, although knowing Pam…"

"… Paige's credit card will be at its max by the end of her third day." Piper finished, "Maybe retail therapy is exactly what she needs though, it'll take her mind off things and give her fresh head on the situation." She shook her head slightly, beaming, "But I don't wanna focus on negative things like that. I'm going out tonight!" She said happily, biting a little on her pen.

Phoebe pouted her lips in interest as her eyebrows shot up, "Well, well, looks like Leo's wanting some of the fun Piper that he saw yesterday. You plan on delivering?"

The eldest Charmed One shrugged coyly, "You never know, I may just have to end the evening with a bang."

"Um… Speaking of not knowing, did Annabelle mention anything about the glaring Phoenix tattoo on her wrist and why it was trying to give her a third degree burn?" Phoebe asked with a monotonous tone, "I never would have guessed that she was a Phoenix, although it explains how she's so good at what she does…"

"She didn't say anything. She was training when I left the house this morning, doing a little tai chi in the garden… But I'm not gonna push it, it's taken her a while to feel comfortable around us and I don't want to pressure her." Piper explained, reaching over the bar and grabbing her purse before shoving all the paper into a purple binder and stuffing it under her arm, "C'mon, let's go, I'm in the mood for some flies…" She said darkly, making Phoebe turn around with a look of fear in her eyes. Piper glared menacingly at her, before breaking out into a smile, "I'm kidding!"

Phoebe's mouth dropped open as she shot a heated glare at her older sister, "Okay, you know what? That is so not funny." She said dramatically, clearly making a joke, "The next time you mutate, I'll just leave you to rot in spider bites!"


	10. Gate With Death

**Gate With Death**

The Manor front door flew open as Piper unlocked it, her luscious brown locks swinging from shoulder to shoulder as she looked around the hallway and living room. "It's okay, sweetie…" She softly assured Lorna, who was balanced on her hip, sucking on her thumb with a fearful expression on her young face, clearly distressed, "Alright, it's clear! In, in, in!" She ordered, ushering people from outside into the house. "We don't have that much time, so move it."

Phoebe gently guided their innocent into the Halliwell ancestral home; she was a young woman with curly blonde-brown hair, her blue eyes wide with fear as she too looked around the house. Her luminous purple skirt was covered in large marks of dirt, along with the cream knitted cardigan that was singed at the sleeves and on the chest. "We gonna be safe, it's alright, trust me." Phoebe whispered to the woman as she guided her in, calming her in the same way Piper was doing for Lorna.

"We don't have much time. He's clearly planning something or he would have just attacked us in the car." Aidan said hurriedly, his face and hands covered in small cuts and bleeding welts, while his clothes were in even worse a state than his sisters in law's innocent. "You guys should go and check the book for a quick fix, something that'll buy us some time."

"He's right." Annabelle said breathlessly, pushing past him to get into the house before pulling on the elemental's jacket and dragging into the house so she could close over the door with a slam. The blonde was in a similar state of Aidan, covered from head to toe in dirt, dust, and wounds. "Diam's not gonna stop coming after her until she's dead. Of course, he'll force her to use her power first."

Piper stormed into the main foyer, throwing her keys down on the marble top table, "I gotta get Lorna outta here. Leo!" She shouted towards the heavens, "Leo, move it! Lorna's in danger!" She bellowed even louder, the fear and urgency clear in her voice.

A channel of orbs fell from the ceiling, culminating into a column of bright, twinkling lights that took on the form of Leo Wyatt immediately, "What is it?" He asked, knowing that something was wrong for his wife to have called in such an aggressive manner, "What happened to you guys?" He asked, looking at Aidan and Annabelle, "Do you need healed?"

"They're just superficial wounds, Leo. Nothing that's gonna kill us." Aidan assured the elder, "Although I could have done without that last throw he did to us… This guy's really strong." He spoke to Annabelle, raising the back of his hand to his mouth and blowing away some of the dirt that was in his wounds.

The mercenary nodded, "You haven't seen anything yet, you try being thrown through a pair of steel elevator doors then falling to the bottom of the shaft. Just be glad the worse thing that can happen in here is being thrown through a wall."

Piper suddenly let out a high pitched whistle to cut through the casual conversation, "We don't have time for this! Here…" She lifted Lorna from her lip, handing her to Leo, "Get her to safety. Now." She ordered darkly, prompting her husband to vanish in a cloud of orbs that shot through the ceiling quicker than usual. "C'mon, let's go check the book." She said to Phoebe, not waiting for an answer before she began to climb the steps.

"We'll be as quick as we can. Just stay calm." Phoebe said to the trio left in the foyer, "I'm either saying that to convince you, or to convince myself, I'll leave you guys to decide on that while I fret upstairs." She babbled, before racing up the stairs as fast as she could after her older sister.

Charlene, the innocent, shook her head vigorously, not understanding why this was happening to her and why her life was in danger, "I don't get it. I haven't used my power in months and I haven't fought a demon in even longer. Why is this guy coming after me? What the hell does he want?" She shrieked, taking deep breaths to try and suppress her panic.

"What's your power?" Annabelle asked, knowing that a being like Diam wasn't stupid enough to just go after a random witch. He went after Charlene for a reason, and it had to be her power.

"Um… I can conjure pretty powerful magical fields, protecting the person in them from even the strongest of magic. It's just about useless in the offensive department, but it's got me out of a few situations unscathed." Charlene quickly replied, rubbing her arms nervously.

"Well, then if this guy can copy powers, then you're going to have to use it on him for him to get it. You should probably create one around yourself if he does get here. You'll be safe that way." Aidan advised, patting her on the shoulder before realizing that his had was bleeding onto her cardigan.

Charlene shook her head, "No, it only protects me from magic; he could just stick his hand through it and strangle me to death…"

Before Aidan or Annabelle could reply, the Manor doors suddenly exploded with an ear pounding explosion, sending a mixture of wood and glass flying into the hallway and making the three of them turn away to avoid any injury to their eyes, When they turned back around, a blur flew from the doorway, knocking Aidan and Annabelle to the floor and leaving Charlene defenseless.

Diam grinned at the witch menacingly, "You got away from me the first time, but not now." He raised his hand, a low humming noise breaking through the air as a sphere of powerful rippling energy pulsed in his hand. "Make a shield around me, and I'll let you live…" He growled, his face growing darker when Charlene shook her head defiantly, "No? Well, alright then!"

"No!" Annabelle shouted, pouncing to her feet and running at Charlene, shoving the witch into the dining room just before the energy flew from Diam's hand. The attack hit the mercenary hard in the stomach, hurling her through the air and throwing her through the wall that separated the sunroom and living room, destroying half of the obstruction as Annabelle flew through the wood, landing on the other side within a pile of debris with blood seeping from her head.

Aidan leapt to a standing position, running into the fight and wheeling back his hand to conjure an icicle that would hopefully distract Diam long enough for Piper and Phoebe to come down the stairs with a solution. Unfortunately, the evil being had created another energy pulse immediately after the first, beating Aidan in speed and blasting him with the same force he had to Annabelle. The elemental flew through the other side of the wall, falling next to the blonde mercenary as he bled heavily from his ear and nose.

Diam turned towards Charlene, pleased with the damage that he had wrought on the two people now dying on the floor. He raised his hand, preparing to finish off the witch in the same way that he had to Aidan and Annabelle, before a white glow slowly consumed him. The evil being frowned, looking at his hands as his entire body shone before turning into a sphere of light that flew out the doorway and out of the Manor.

Piper and Phoebe raced down the stairs, immediately taking in the scene, "Looks like the purging evil spell worked!" Phoebe said brightly, following her sister down into the foyer where Charlene stood, still in shock over what she had just witnessed, and where Aidan and Annabelle were lying in the debris, "Oh my God…"

"Leo! Leo!" Piper called out, kneeling down in front of the dying pair and looking up when her husband appeared within a column of bright orbs that deposited both him and Lorna into the house, "Hurry!" The eldest Charmed One urged, standing up and taking the redheaded toddler from the elder's grasp, leading her away from the blood.

Leo knelt down and held his hands over the two victims. Strong golden glows were blasted from each hand as his healing power began to take effect. The blood that they had lost was now trickling back into their wounds, before the wounds themselves closed up. Even the original injuries they had had before Diam's entrance were healed. The glow stopped, and a groan from Annabelle calmed everyone's fears.

"Whoa…" She breathed, struggling to get herself into a sitting position. The blonde looked around at what she was sitting in; frowning when she realized that it was the wreckage from the wall. "Okay, ow!" Annabelle exclaimed, "What the hell happened?" She asked loudly, holding the back of her head where she had been bleeding from.

"Oh… Nothing, just the usual brink of death kinda thing." Piper droned, gently bouncing Lorna up and down as she whimpered into her shoulder, her psychic powers picking up the tension in the room and making her feel uncomfortable. "You sure you guys are alright? That can be a pretty rough blow, trust me." She said darkly, remembering all too well that Prue had died from similar injuries.

Aidan cracked his neck as he sat up, wincing slightly, "Yeah, fine, a little sore though…" He said lowly, pushing down on the ground as he stood up, holding out his hand and helping Annabelle to her feet, both of them still feeling slightly stiff from their recoveries. "I wonder where he got that power from. It certainly wasn't one of us."

"No, but it was the one from the male witch he went after a couple of days ago. He had the power to create strong concussive blasts like the ones that hit us." Annabelle confirmed, turning to Piper and Phoebe, "I thought you guys said that you had safeguarded him, and that you had set him up with a crystal alarm." She accused the two witches with her eyebrows raised.

"We did!" Phoebe protested, "We cloaked him, gave him potions, spells… Not to mention a way to contact us. It would take a serious level of magic to even find him after all that mojo we cast on him!" She argued, before her expression softened and she looked to the floor, "Although nothing we've seen has suggested that Diam doesn't possess a serious level of magic…"

"Poor Rory…" Piper said sadly, thinking of the witch that they had helped out a few days ago, "I wonder what actually happ-," She cut herself off when a white hot glow erupted from her jacket pocket. Swinging Lorna around to her other hip, the eldest Charmed One shoved her hand in, pulling it out with a glowing magic crystal that was shining fiercely, making her turn her head away from the light.

A swirl of bright lights began to conjure themselves in the foyer. They were weak, fading in and out as if they were struggling to sustain their own being. They suddenly fell of the floor with a thud, revealing that a severely injured man had been in their centre the entire time. His body was covered in cuts; his clothes were torn and laden with thick layers of dirt and dust. He let out a small choked cough, before falling unconscious, a glowing crystal rolling out of his limp hand and falling to the floor, losing its light as it left his palm.

Phoebe's jaw dropped at the sight of their previous innocent, Rory, "So… Are we still wondering what happened to him?"

* * *

A soft smile played on Paige's lips as she felt the gentle breeze in her face, her dark hair blowing softly in the wind as she closed her eyes, taking in the faint sounds of the bustling island from so far up. Through all the sounds of the traffic, the people, and the general noise of the city, the witchlighter focused on the most peaceful sound that reached her ears. She could hear the ocean that was all around her, sloshing gently and lapping around the harbour. It was one of the most pleasant sounds she had ever heard.

"Hey." Pamela greeted as she came down the hallway, looking out the living room to see that her aunt was standing out on the balcony. The witch looked at her watch, her eyebrows going up when she saw the time, "Okay, who the hell gets up at six thirty in the morning when they're on vacation? You should be in bed resting your legs after all the walking we did yesterday… I don't think I've ever shopped so much in my life!" She went over the kitchen, grabbing a coffee cup from the cupboard above the counter and smiling when she saw the pot was full, "Fabulous…" She murmured, pouring herself a cup and taking a sip, "Okay, if I talk to myself for much longer, you're going to be verging on rude status."

Paige sniggered, pursing her lips, "Oh, sorry… I can see why you wanted to leave San Francisco. This city is beautiful; I could spend the rest of my life on this balcony right here." She laid her hands on the railing, smiling, "So, what have you got planned for me today?" The witchlighter asked brightly, turning to her niece and folding her arms.

"Um… I'm not gonna be here for most of the morning, I've got a lecture at eight a.m. which I'm basically late for already." She frowned at Paige's amused look, "Hey, don't laugh, you wouldn't believe what a nightmare it is to actually get around in this damn city in the morning and in the evening. Sweetie, just be lucky your time here isn't ruled by that exact thing: time." Pamela advised, grabbing her coat from the back of the couch, "But there's a nice little breakfast place across the street if you want to stretch your legs with the twins when they wake up."

"Okay. What about Jordann? Doesn't she need to get up for class or anything?" Paige asked cautiously, jumping a little when Pamela let out a loud but short laugh.

"Oh, please. Her first class isn't until two. You'll be lucky if she surfaces before one… lucky bitch." She grabbed her keys from the counter and swung her bag over her head, letting it hang off her shoulder securely, "Okay, I will be back later, so we'll go lunch or something, and hopefully talk about the marital issues you're having with Aquaman…" She smirked.

Paige rolled her eyes and turned back to the view, "Alright, fine."

"Perfect! I'll be back around one-ish, so you be ready. Living in New York isn't all just sleeping in until the middle of the afternoon… unless you're Jordann." Pamela growled to herself as she went out the door, shooting her aunt a supportive smile for exiting the apartment.

* * *

"You said he wouldn't find me! You said I was safe, and then he finds me, takes my power, and kicks the crap outta me!" Rory shouted, glowering at Piper who stood in front of him, nervously rolling her hands around in one another. The male witch made a step towards the Charmed One, only for the five crystals surrounding him to flare up with an angry white glow and repel him from the force field. Rory gritted his teeth in pain, "… And now you're holding me against my will!" He argued, looking around at the crystals, "And crystals aren't supposed to trap the ones they're protecting, what the hell are these?"

"Sorry, Ror." Piper said sympathetically, "But these days, we can't leave anything up to chance. These crystals keep you in, and keep everyone else out…" She stepped towards the barrier to prove her point, being repelled immediately by the wavering cage of energy and falling back a few steps, "See?" She asked rhetorically shaking off the residual buzz from colliding with the cage, "If you hadn't tried to run out the door and get yourself killed, we wouldn't have had to resort to doing this."

Rory glared at the witch on the other side of the force field, before turning to Charlene, who was sitting on the couch that was within the perimeter of the crystals, "You should get out of here while you can, you know. Trusting these guys is just going to get you killed even faster."

"Hey, okay, you know what? You're about one bad jibe away from getting a sleeping potion hurled at you, so unless you have anything nice or relevant to say, cram it." She spat, turning towards Phoebe who was thumbing through the book, "I'm start to regret the fact that Leo healed you so much that you woke up…" Piper growled, before giving her sister an odd look, "I thought you said you weren't wearing maternity clothes for this pregnancy."

Phoebe looked down; putting her thumb under the elastic of her pants and stretching them a little before letting them go. A nervous smile crossed her face as she refused to look at her sister, "That was until one of the buttons on my pants popped off in a meeting yesterday…"

The eldest Charmed One's eyes widened with shock as she tried to suppress her laughter, "Wow, how embarrassing!"

"Yeah, but I think Elise was more angry than amused when the button flew off and hit her in the eye." Phoebe said quietly, her face going red at the very memory of what had happened the previous day, "So, have we got a plan here or what? I mean, Diam is either going to go after another witch or come after these guys. We need to be prepared." She stated, clasping her hands over the Book of Shadows.

Piper folded her arms, shrugging, "Well, we could make some potions that replicate our powers so we aren't forced into using them and giving them to him, but carrying potions like that is a pretty big hazard. One spark and they would go up…" She trailed off, looking down at the floor, "I think that's the limit to what we can do, well, without Paige of course."

Phoebe cringed a little, thinking that her younger sister was better off where she was, "Um… Why don't we just call her in if it's absolutely necessary? We can handle this for now, there's no need to bother her. Although we should probably get Aidan and Annabelle if Diam strikes again, they're the ones who fought him off this morning."

"Look who we found out at the front porch. We nearly decked him by accident." Aidan said darkly as he entered, turning to the attic door and watching as Brennan entered with Annabelle. The mutant was holding onto his left arm, rolling his shoulder and wincing a little as he glared at the blonde woman standing next to him.

"Did you have to twist my arm so hard?" He asked, glowering at the mercenary, who merely rolled her eyes in response.

"Oh please, if I had really wanted to hurt you, you would have known all about it." She said with a roll of her eyes, patting him on the other shoulder and walking towards the book, "You might want to comfort your husband about the fatal injury I inflicted upon him, he only has the rest of his natural life to live." She said sarcastically, making Phoebe purse her lips and she tried to suppress her laughter.

"Aw… baby, I'm sorry. I just got caught up in all of this and I forgot you were coming back today." She said in a soft voice, wrapping her arms around his neck and placing a kiss on his lips before hugging him fully, "I called Connor's preschool and asked if they could keep him until three. It'll give us time to get everything sorted out."

"What get sorted out? Does this have anything to do with why I was pinned to the ground when I just tried to ring the doorbell?" Brennan asked, keeping his hands around Phoebe's arms and into her eyes, "What's going on?" He asked, looking up and addressing the room.

Before anyone could answer his question, a column of bright white and blue lights descended from the ceiling, culminating in the room and leaving Leo in their place. He stepped out of the residual aura of light his orbs left at a fast pace, "We gotta move, another witch is about to come under attack, and we don't have a lot of time." He said urgently, not evening noticing Brennan's return.

"Why? What did the Elders tell you? And how do they know another witch is under attack?" Piper asked, folding her arms and preparing to listen intently. She didn't want to waste time when an innocent's life was in danger.

"Well, we've all been pulling our abilities together, trying to stretch our third eye into the future and to help you guys out down here, and a few seconds ago, we were hit with the vision of a young witch, around Pam's age, her name's Eva and she's in danger." He quickly explained, "We also support your theory that Diam is up to something and these attacks aren't random."

The eldest Charmed One gave her husband a suspicious look, "Since when were you so… eldery?" She asked with a hint of resentment in her voice, "'We've' been doing this… 'we've' been doing that… What's the matter with you?" Piper asked with a frown, rather unnerved by his behaviour.

"It's nothing, it just requires all elders to pull together to get such strong visions… And since I am an elder, I add to their collective strength. It's like with you and your sisters with the Power of Three, each of you add to the collective power. Is it wrong that we're trying to help?" Leo said with unexpected vigour, clearly offended by his wife's actions.

Phoebe, seeing that this was going to turn into a situation, turned around from Brennan, putting an arm around his back as he put one around her shoulder, "So!" She suddenly boomed, making both Rory and Charlene jump from their sitting positions, "Do you know where this girl is or do we need to find her for you? Because we'll need something to scry with." She informed her brother in law, causing him to put his hand into his jacket pocket.

"This belongs to Eva. Her whitelighter gave it to me for you guys to use with the crystal." He informed them, bringing out a simple silver bracelet and holding it up to the light, "Whitelighters have personal effects from charges that are more of a target for demons, so they can be tracked down in an event like this." Leo said, looking towards Annabelle, "Which reminds me, I have to give you something."

"Later." She said flatly, giving him a look before going back to the Book of Shadows.

"Speaking of her whitelighter…" Aidan spoke up, folding his arms, "Why can't he track her down by himself? I mean, she's not in any immediate danger right now, and I'm assuming she hasn't been taken down to the Underworld, so why can't he just sense her and orb her to safety?" He lowered himself into an old armchair, bending forward slightly and listening to what was being said.

Leo looked down at the bracelet in his hands, his face going red with embarrassment, "Well… She's sorta… Well, Eva's a difficult person. She didn't want a whitelighter so she's cloaked herself from our radar. The last whitelighter she had was forced into giving up; after she blew him up so many times with potions that she seemed to carry around with her…"

Phoebe snorted with laughter, "Wow, I'm liking this Eva chick already…"

"We'll get right on it." Annabelle said, walking over to the elder and taking the bracelet from his hands, walking towards the map on the table and picking up the amethyst, beginning to scry for the witch, "Anything else we should know? Like, what her powers are for starters." She asked, not looking up from the map.

The elder shrugged, "Her whitelighter is busy dealing with a another charge, so we can't contact him for any information, and we don't have anything on her because she's cloaked from us, so you guys are just going to have to do this on your own." He clasped his hands in front of them, taking in a breath, "I should probably go back up and see if I can help add to the collective strength." He stared into Piper's eyes, "See you later…" He breathed, before vanishing in a swirl of twinkling orbs that shot through the ceiling.

"What the hell crawled up his ass and exploded?" Piper spat, spinning around to Annabelle who was concentrating on the map in front of her, "You've known him for longer than us, has he ever acted like this before?" She asked quickly almost babbling for an answer.

The mercenary shook her head, "Oh no, I'm not getting involved in your marital issues. The third person is always the one that gets it in the end, and it never ends well…" She said, her brown eyes following the crystal intently as it spun across the map, making Piper wonder how she wasn't beginning to feel dizzy.

Her train of thought was interrupted by a buzzing noise and a loud curse. She turned her head, glowering at Rory, who had once again tried to escape from the crystal cage, "Hey! There is a two year old girl in this house, you swear that loudly again and Diam will be the least of your problems, you hear me?" She growled.

The male witch shook his head, mumbling lowly under his breath before flopping into the couch next to Charlene, "You know, you should really try and calm down. We're under the protection of the Charmed Ones, can you think of anyone that would keep us safer?" Charlene asked him, earning a defiant grunt in response.

"You see, that's the kind of faith we need you to have in us!" Phoebe said, pointing rudely to Rory, "Nothing is going to happen to you, we won't let it!" She protested, leaning against Brennan's chest and looking up at him, smiling, "So, how do I look? Big?" She asked with a smirk, stepping back so he could see her properly.

Brennan smiled, moving back towards her and hooking an arm around her waist and laying his other hand on her stomach. "You look beautiful." He said sincerely, kissing her deeply and bringing his hand up to her cheek, "It looks like pregnancy agrees with you." The mutant commented, still grinning, "I wish we could take Connor out of preschool and go to lunch or something."

"Hate to break up the love fest." Annabelle said drolly, cutting through the soft atmosphere immediately with her harsh tone as her hard brown eyes look up from the map. She had stopped spinning the crystal, as it had landed on a location. The mercenary locked eyes with everyone who was looking towards her, "I've found Eva…"

* * *

"Thank you." Pamela said politely to the waitress as she set down a pair of frothy cappuccinos in front of her and her aunt. "Um… Could you maybe bring over a couple bowls of ice cream for the kids?" She asked with a slight cringe, knowing that most of the restaurants she went to didn't usually cater to kids. She was pleased when the women broke out into a smile and nodded, "Ah, thank you." She turned back to the twins who were currently getting their faces wiped down by their mother, "I can't believe they actually sat still for an hour."

Paige's eyebrows rose as she nodded, "I know, it's a miracle. Now, let's not jinx it by talking about it too much. You hear that, girls? Pam's getting you some ice cream!" She said with an exaggerated smile that Pamela could easily see through. Her aunt was still reeling from the way she had left San Francisco. She may have been here, but her heart certainly wasn't.

"All gode!" Melinda grinned as Paige finished wiping the toddler's mouth with a napkin. "Ad dow, ice cweam!" She said with a delighted squeal, taking her sister's hand and shaking it vigorously with excitement, "Ice cweam, ice cweam, ice cweam!" She continued to squeal joyously, until Paige gently laid a finger over her lips, signing for her to be quiet.

"Dank you, Pam." Emma grinned mischievously, making Pamela slightly suspicious. Her little cousins never expressed gratitude for anything like this, and especially along with a smile that meant she was up to something. The witch made a mental note to keep an eye on her little cousin before grabbing a packet of sugar and pouring it into her coffee.

"So, you wanna tell me the real reason for you fleeing to the other side of country? I mean, sure, the five new pairs of shoes and the snapshots of the Statue of Liberty are great and all, but we both know that's not why you're here." She raised a questioning eyebrow, "C'mon, talk to me. I got eyes to see, a mouth to speak, and ears to listen." She tapped Paige's hand playfully. "What's your problem with the marine mammal this time?"

Paige let out a snort of laughter, "Do you know haven't called him by his actual name ever since I've been here?"

"That's because when I mentioned his name when you first got off the plane, you got all teary and distant, and God knows that wouldn't have been fun to drag around when shopping." Pamela said flatly, folding her arms and setting them down on the table, "Was it something that you really had to cross America to get away from?" She asked softly.

The witchlighter let out an angry sigh, smiling tightly at the waitress as she set down the small bowls of ice cream at the twins' places at the table, "Thank you…" She murmured politely, before her face returned to its expression confusion, "I don't know… At first, I was angry at him for not trusting me and getting all pissy at the very mention of Hades… But now I don't know where I stand." She admitted.

"Did you ever think that he didn't not trust you? You've certainly never given him reason not to, unless there's a sordid affair that I don't have all the scandal on yet…" Pamela smirked, taking a sip of her coffee.

"What else could it be?" The youngest Charmed One breathed, clearly at a loss.

Her niece shrugged in response, "Well… I don't know. Jealousy? I mean, first of all, you sleep with Hades while you're still with him. Even if you were evil, you still cheated on him. Then after he left, Hades was still on your mind, probably even more so than Aidan when I think about it." She offered an explanation, before her eyes shifted to something on the empty table next to them, where the bill tray was sitting with a ten dollar bill tip. Suddenly, the money vanished in a slosh of glass-like water, disappearing from the tray in a splash, and reappearing in Emma's hand. Pamela's eyes widened with surprise and she nearly dropped her coffee cup.

"Yeah, but I wasn't thinking about Hades romantically. If anything, I was repulsed and dreading the thought of having his children, although it turned out they weren't so bad after all…" Paige trailed off, shaking the notion out of her head, "Are you alright?" She asked, seeing that Pamela was now coughing a little.

"Me? Oh, yeah, fine. The coffee just went down the wrong way, that's all." She said with a smile, "Go on," She urged, making a subtle glance towards her cousins' laps, to see they were laden with coins and dollar bills. She tried to maintain a calm composure, until she noticed a batch of coins vanish in a puddle of water on the table in front of them, landing into the twins' laps.

"… So maybe I'm just blowing all of this out of proportion." Paige sighed. Pamela realized that she hadn't even been listening to her aunt. "I mean, I miss him, and the girls need him, so maybe I should just go back." The youngest Charmed One smiled to herself, "Thanks, Pam. For letting me stay and for the advice… I'll be out of your hair tomorrow." She said, looking a lot more content that she had since she had first arrived.

"No problem." Pamela replied airily, before her ears twitched at the sound of the waiters talking a few feet away from her.

"Is it me, or are people just not tipping today?"

"I know! The lunchtime rush is usually where the big money is made, but the most I got was when I found a dollar on the floor."

"Wow, that's sad."

"Yeah, I'm hoping that table with the two women and the twin girls will pay out. The younger looking one's pretty good looking."

"Yeah, she's got a great ass too!"

Pamela's eye twitched slightly with anger. She didn't take kindly to comments like that, but she didn't want to be caught with the thieving children. She calmly set down her coffee cup and smiled at her aunt, "Glad I could help." She murmured shakily, "Um… We should probably go going now." The witch advised with a forced smile.

"Um… Alright, just give me a little time to freshen up." Paige replied, grabbing her purse and getting up to go the bathroom.

Pamela watched until her aunt had disappeared from sighed, before suddenly lowering her head down to her cousins' eye level. "Put it back. Now." She hissed under her breath just loud enough for the two of them to hear her.

"What?" Melinda and Emma asked innocently in unison.

"You know what!" She seethed, "If you don't put that money back, I will tell your Mom and she will bind both of your powers, and if she doesn't, I will. Stealing is wrong!" She pointed to both of the girls.

Emma pouted and frowned deeply at her eldest cousin before looking down at her lap and glaring darkly at the mound of money on her lap. It was all swept up in a large torrent of sparkling water that burst in the toddler's lap, not leaving a trace of it even being there. Small splashes of water ignited around the restaurant, returning the money to its rightful places. "Dere!" She said angrily, folding her arms.

"Thank you." Pamela retorted with the same of amount of sarcasm, before finishing off the rest of her coffee and standing up as Paige came towards her, flicking her hair away from her shoulders and making it flow down her back as she smiled, "Okay, are we ready to go? I would like to get a little shopping done before I leave." She grinned.

"Sure." She turned around to the two waiters that she had overheard earlier, "S'cuse me, can we get the bill?"

The two of them a glance and a smirk, before one of them walked towards the four of them, "Certainly." He said with a sickly smile, turning on his heel and heading towards the bar to collect the bill, before Pamela politely tapped him on the shoulder, causing him to turn back around.

"I may as well give you your tip right now. The next time you want to compliment on a girl's ass, at least make the effort to make sure that she's out of earshot. Moron." She spat, glaring at the waiter as his face turned scarlet, before he turned around and scurried towards the till, ignoring his sniggering friend. Pamela turned back around to her aunt, who gave her a perplexed look, "Really, don't ask…"

* * *

Eva sighed as she continued to stack books onto the shelf. She had a look at the cover and gave it a contemptuous stare. It was entitled "Are You Too Fat?" these kind of books made her feel ill, and not because of the nauseating picture of greasy meat on the cover. It was because they were the kind of books that planted little obsessions inside people's heads, making them think that they have a problem when they don't. She continued to stock the shelf, all the while glaring at the copy upon copy of this grotesque book.

"Okay, Gil, I'm done stacking those self-help books, I'm going on my…" She trailed off, looking around with shock at the usual bustling book shop. The entire place seemed to have, for lack of a better term, frozen. Every customer was halted in their movements, whether it be reaching for a book on a shelf, handing over money to the employee behind the counter, or just walking around the shop. Time seemed to have just… stopped. "Hello?" She called out timidly, turning around and nearly jumping out of her skin when she was faced with four people at the bottom of the isle. "Who are you?" She asked, trying to stay strong and cursing her useless power at the same time.

Piper raised her hands calmly, "It's alright, we're the good guys. My name's Piper, and…" The eldest Charmed One turned to Annabelle, Aidan, and Brennan, trying to think of a way to explain the three of them, "… They're something that can't be covered in one sentence." She explained flatly with dull eyes.

"Did you freeze everyone?" Eva asked with a perplexed look, cocking her head slightly.

"Yeah, I'm a witch like you. It's one of my powers." Piper quickly explained, walking towards her, "Listen, I've love to say and chat about powers, but we really need to get you to safety, there's a-,"

She didn't even get to finish her sentence, as the set of book shelves next to them suddenly exploded in a fashion which was identical to the way Piper would have used her power. The eldest Charmed One tackled Eva to floor to avoid any of wood shafts from flying into her and injuring her severely. The two were buried underneath a pile of shattered oak, but Piper could see out just enough to spot a black boot amidst the rubble. Diam.

Piper dove to her feet, the wood that had landed on her back flying everywhere she stood up and threw out her hands, blasting the being back with an explosion of fiery sparks that ignited against his chest and throwing him back against one of the many shelves, causing a lot of books to topple from their places and onto the floor. "Beat you to it." She sneered, calmly clasping her hands together and putting them under her chin.

"Not for long," he growled, his mouth twisting into a grin as he activated the telekinesis he had copied from Paige and threw his arm across his chest, hurling Piper back into the bookcase closest to her and making it topple as she was thrown into it. She landed on top, her form twisted uncomfortably in the wrecked set of shelves.

"Alright, I've had enough of this…" Brennan growled, bringing up both of his hands and igniting sizzling electrical energy into each hand.

"Brennan, no!" Annabelle ordered, but it was too late, the tesla coils flew from the mutant's hands, illuminating the poorly lit bookshop in a bright, flashing, blue light as the lightning pummeled Diam's chest, send an electric shock through his body causing all his muscles to tense up as he did.

The being's leather biker's jacket sizzled and smoked from the abuse, "Thanks…" He growled, before hurl his hands outwards towards Brennan and throwing one large tesla coil from the collective energy in his hands. The electricity hit the mutant so quickly that he didn't even have time to activate his third power and erect a shield. It threw him across the store, throwing him against the back wall before he fell to the ground hard.

"Aidan, get Eva outta here." Annabelle ordered, wheeling back her arm before launching a neon blue energy ball from her palm that collided with Diam's chest, not having much effect. "Go! I'll keep him busy!" She urged, repeating the process once more and hurling another energy ball into the evil being's chest, still not having much effect as she silently willed Piper to get up.

Realizing that this would be their only chance to get the innocent to safety, Aidan ran to the recovering woman underneath the bookcase debris, gently putting his hand on her shoulder and disappearing in a torrent of water that left no trace of moisture or anything to suggest that it had even been there.

Annabelle gritted her teeth as another energy ball flew from her palm, zipping towards Diam before he suddenly vanished in a blur, letting then sphere fly through where he was stood and incinerate a bookshelf behind it, reducing it to a pile of fried paper and fire within a second. "What the hell…?" She breathed, confused as to why the being has fled when, in all their other battles, he had shown that he could beat them all.

"Okay, that hurt a little." Piper groaned as she sat up, holding the back of her head and cringing, "Remind me to tell Paige that she really does have kick ass powers the next time I see her…" She growled, getting to her feet, but wobbling slightly and feeling a little disorientated.

"Yeah, well, looks like Diam got another power." Annabelle sighed, gesturing towards Brennan who was just coming around from his electrical assault, "It's a good thing electricity already runs through his body. A shock like that would have killed a normal person, maybe even a witch at a push."

"Where's Aidan?" Piper asked, noticing that the elemental had seemed to vanish, along with their innocent.

"I told to get the hell outta here with the innocent. He should be back at the Manor forming a game plan." Annabelle replied, turning towards Brennan as he walked towards them, walking stiffly from electrical charge his body has suffered from, "Sorry, we forgot to tell you that you really shouldn't use your powers on this guy. He copies them and uses them against you." She said sympathetically.

"And you didn't think that information would have been useful before all this happened?" He said bitterly, giving his body a shake to try and return its flexibility, "We should probably head back. Having those three innocents in the house could be a little dangerous." He advised.

Piper let out a sigh, putting her hands on her hips, "And of course, it would have to be _my_ house."

* * *

A swarm of particles buzzed and swirled around in the attic, wavering for a slight second as they all stopped in their tracks before coming together and forming Piper, Annabelle, and Brennan. The three of them looked around, their suspicions raised when they saw Paige sitting with Phoebe, who had an icepack to her head, while Pamela watched over the two with her arms folded. "What's going on?" Piper asked, stumbling slightly when Brennan brushed past her to aid his wife.

"I came up here and found Auntie Pheebs on the floor, and when Dad and Uncle Aidan didn't come, I called for Auntie Paige." Wyatt quickly explained from his stance behind the sofa. He laid a hand on his aunt's shoulder, making her turn around, "Do you want anything, Aunt Phoebe?"

Phoebe smiled and put her hand on his, "No, sweetie, I'm alright. But thank you. Calling your Auntie Paige, it was the right thing to do…" She said with a reassuring smile, "Actually, could you go and get me a glass of water, please?" She asked with a hopeful glance, knowing that they should talk about what happened when Wyatt wasn't in the room.

"Okay."

"Oh my God!" Piper suddenly exclaimed, putting her hands to her face, "Lorna! Lorna was downstairs having her nap. Wyatt!" She shouted after her son as he disappeared down the stairs, "Go and check on your little sister! And where is your brother?" Piper called out, frowning when she realized that she had just referred to Lorna as Wyatt's sibling.

"They're both fine, Mom. Chris took her downstairs with him to finish off the rest of the brownies that are in the refrigerator!" Wyatt called back, going downstairs to get a glass of water for his aunt.

"Okay, what the hell happened? And where are all of our innocents?" Piper asked her younger sister in a high pitched voice, gesturing to the burn marks where the crystals had once sat around the two witches, "And what happened to the cage? Did he just charge through it or something? And what-,"

"Piper! Listen to me!" Phoebe urged, wincing a little as she pressed the icepack harder against her head, "I had transported the innocents them to a safe place with a spell. Diam was never after them… It's been Aidan all this time. As soon as he came back from getting Eva to safety, Diam flew in here, hit him with a concussion blast, and took him outta here. It all happened so fast…" Phoebe she said quietly, before her breathing began to quicken, "Whoa… Whoa!" She gasped, as her mind was suddenly pummeled with images that were more vivid than anything she had ever experienced…

_Diam stood on a large elevated platform in the centre of a dark chamber, the only dim light coming from weak torches hung on the wall. He was staring at a massive set of iron doors that had intricate carvings of various magical symbols that were meant to protect and to bind. The rock face around the doors had also been carved out; elaborate designs above the iron monstrosities giving the whole crypt-like structure a sense of foreboding. He turned around, smirking. "At long last… I can return…"_

_Aidan was brought towards them by two cloaked figures. From what Phoebe could see, it was if the cloaks were animated to act like living beings, as she couldn't see anything underneath them, and that Aidan was being held by invisible forces that were coming out of the empty sleeve. The two beings tore his shirt off, the buttons flying everywhere and exposing the elemental's bare chest as he fought against the two creatures that were folding him in place._

"_I've waited centuries for this…" Diam growled, bringing out an athame from his back and advancing on Aidan. "And now it's finally happening." Quickly and expertly, he made shallow cuts in the man's chest, making Aidan grit his teeth in pain as blood began to pour from the five straight cuts, making a pentagram. "Sorry, but this part has to go in a little deeper." Diam said with a sick smile, before pushing the athame into the elemental's chest once more slashing horizontally across the top point of the pentagram. Aidan let out a roar of pain as even more blood poured from his body, making him lose his balance and fall to his knees. Diam made two small cuts at the left side of the top line, making an arrow that sat through the highest point of the pentagram._

_Bright blue energy suddenly erupted from the symbol etched into Aidan's chest, making him scream with rage and pain as streams of aquamarine light flew from each point of the pentagram, and the end of the arrow. The various streams shifted and coiled, almost dancing in the air before plowing into the symbols on the iron gate. Each protection rune glowed at the energy hit it, before there was an echoing groan and the gate began to creak open. A blinding white light came through from the crack in the two doors, illuminating Diam's grinning face._

"_Finally…"_

Phoebe came out of her vision with a gasp, and was surprised when Paige let out a similar noise. The witchlighter's hand had been on her sister's leg when the vision had hit. Had she somehow intercepted it and managed to see it too? "Wow…" The middle Charmed One breathed, "That was certainly new…"

"What do you mean?" Piper asked with a frown.

"I think it was… monition. As in, it was happening while I was seeing it… It was way too vivid to be of the future, premonitions are always a little unclear because the event hasn't happened yet, but this one…" She trailed off, trying to think, and was startled when Paige leapt off the sofa.

"What are we waiting for? Aidan's in trouble!" She exclaimed, grabbing Piper's hand and preparing to orb out, before the eldest Charmed One shook her hand out of her younger sister's grasp.

"Hold it! I know you saw what Phoebe saw and all, but you don't even know where he is. You want to just orb randomly all over the Underworld? Because lemme tell you, that is not a good plan!" Piper urged, shaking her hand out and away from Paige.

"I know where he is!" She spat back, looking down at the floor, "I don't know what it is… But I can sense him and I can tell he's hurt and dying… I think his soul is calling to me…" She said softly, before retaining her tough composure, "Look, you guys can either come with me, or I'm going alone." She said with determination, looking at Piper and Pamela. "What's it going to be?"

* * *

Paige, Piper, Pamela, and Annabelle appeared in the cavern within a mixture of orbs and particles. Immediately, the two cloaked beings flew at the foursome in an eerie fashion, hurling themselves artfully into the air and landing in front of them. Pamela reacted quickly throwing out her hands and blasting the creature back, causing him to fly into the bumpy wall of the cave. "Get to Aidan." She said simply, walking towards her enemy calmly while Annabelle fiercely with the second being.

Piper and Paige ran up the small flight of steps to the podium where Aidan lay on the ground, blood still flowing from the wounds on his chest. "Aidan… Hold on…" Paige whispered, laying a hand on his shoulder and squeezing it gently before putting both palms across his chest, letting a golden glow wash over his wounds and begin to heal him.

"Where did Diam go in the vision?" Piper asked, squinting her eyes at the blinding white light that was coming from the opened gates. She knew the being wouldn't have gone far, especially after what she had heard about Phoebe's premonition. Paige looked up and nodded to the doors, before going back to healing her husband, "Alright…" The eldest Charmed One growled, getting to her feet and running towards the white light.

"Piper, come back!" Paige screamed over the noise of the battle Pamela and Annabelle were waging behind her. It was too late, her older sister had vanished into the light, leaving to trace of her even being there in the first place. The light blasting from her hands suddenly stopped. Paige frowned, seeing that there was still a blatantly visible scar left on Aidan's chest.

His eyes flickered open and he frowned at who he saw kneeling over him. The elemental smiled, raising his hand to Paige's cheek and stroking it delicately, "Hey…" He breathed, still in a certain amount of pain from the scarring on his chest. "I missed you…"

Paige let out a small laugh and a smile as she took his hand in hers, "Hey... You too…"

Annabelle fought like it was an exquisite dance. She artfully dodged her enemy's seemingly non-existent fists, bending, twisting, ducking, jumping, she moved with such a grace that no human could harness. She hit away the being's flying fist with her forearm, blocking the punch and suddenly falling to the floor, sweeping her leg around her attacker's shins and causing him to fall to the floor with a thud that made a lot of noise for a creature was seemed not to even be there. With a casual flick of her wrist, Annabelle threw an energy ball from her palm. The projectile collided with whatever was underneath cloak, causing her enemy to combust in a shower of fiery red sparks and leave an empty black cloak behind.

Pamela ran up the wall slightly, jumping from it and launching her foot at the creature's head, causing him to topple to the floor and be at her mercy, before it suddenly up against her, tackling the witch to the floor. "Get off, you walking fashion disaster!" She growled, squinting her eyes and telekinetically throwing him into the air so he landed behind Paige, who was still tending to Aidan. The cloaked figure got to its feet, suddenly flying at the youngest Charmed One with unimaginable stealth, "Paige! Behind you!" Pamela bellowed, hoping that her aunt would be able to stop the attacker in time.

Paige turned around, and, without even squinting or making a gesture, telekinetically threw her enemy in the opposite direction, hurling him across the floor and causing him to skid along the dusty ground before his invisible head smacked off the cave wall. The witchlighter sat in momentary shock at the advancement of power she had just displayed, before she was brought back to her senses by the flash of neon blue from an energy ball flying from Annabelle's hand and plowing into the demon, reducing him to a smoldering cloak within a matter of seconds.

"How the hell did you do that?" Pamela asked as she jumped up to the elevated platform, "I mean, I didn't you squint your eyes, did you?" She asked, folding her arms and expressing her jealousy for her aunt's power advancement.

"Why are you surprised at this?" Annabelle asked, sincerely confused, "The actual meaning of telekinesis is to move things with your mind, not by squinting eyes or making gestures. It's the natural course for her powers to take. And besides, what are you complaining about? Your power is a lot more advanced than hers." She pointed out, before looking around the cavern. "Where's Piper?"

As if to answer her question, a stream of glowing orbs fell through the ceiling, hitting the floor and taking on the form of Piper. The eldest Charmed One gave a quick scan of her surroundings, before realizing where she was. Slowly, the iron doors began to close with a creak, "NO! Leo!" She screamed, running towards the doors just as they completely shut, slamming her head off the iron and falling to the ground. Piper sat on the ground, stunned for a few moments, before jumping to her feet and throwing her hands at the door, explosion after explosion bouncing harmlessly off the gates, not even leaving a scratch or a scorch mark.

"Piper, what's wrong?" Pamela asked timidly.

Piper sniffed as she lowered her hands, giving up on trying to blow up the gateway. She turned around to the group, tears rolling down her cheeks as her bottom lip began to quiver. A sign that she was barely holding it together. She took a deep breath, trying to compose herself a just a few seconds to talk coherently, "Leo's dead…"

* * *


	11. One Sleepless Night

**One Sleepless Night**

Pamela weakly raised a beer bottle to her mouth, sucking on the neck gratefully as she drank the frothy liquid. She let out a sigh, bringing the bottle down from her face and looking out the bustling city beneath her. Her eyes were red and bloodshot with a mixture of tears and fatigue, she hadn't slept her uncle's disappearance, and replaying the story Piper had relayed to them all only made her even more upset. "What's that, you say?" She said to the beer bottle, "You want me to drink the rest of you and your friend? Well, I could never say no to alcohol." She murmured, tossing the rest of the beverage back and dropping the bottle to the ground, letting her head rest on the large silver funnel that she was leaning on.

She turned her head, watching as someone came up to her from behind the funnel. "Hey…" Keith murmured softly, looking down at the sitting woman and giving her a sympathetic glance, "Um… I stopped by your apartment to see if you in. Jordann told me you were up here and filled me in…" He explained, sitting down next to her and taking one of the unopened beer bottles. "How many have you had?"

Pamela chuckled a little at the question, "This is my first one." She said, waving the bottle in her hand, "I just look like crap all the time these days… I can't really be bothered making the effort, so I'm not drunk or hung over if that's what you're thinking." She laid down her bottle, glaring at the top of Keith's beer and causing the bottle top to telekinetically fly off, "I didn't bring a bottle opener."

"Handy." Keith commented, taking a sip and sitting in silence for a few moments as the girl next to him stared blankly out towards the city. "You wanna talk about it?" He asked, earning a look from Pamela, "I mean, people aren't usually this upset about a distant relative… I take it you were close with your uncle?"

She nodded slowly in response, "Yeah. He was a great guy to talk to if you had a problem. He would just sit there and listen, and if you broke down at the end, he still wouldn't say a word, he'd just give you a hug, then he'd offer a little pep talk." She looked Keith in the eye, "A little like you." She murmured, letting her head fall to his shoulder, "You're a rock, you know that?"

Keith smiled in response, "Yeah, well, that's what happens when you spend your childhood emotionally detached from people. You don't really register any problems of your own in your head, so you listen to other people's problems." He explained, taking another swig from his beer, "But something tells me you're a little like that too."

At this, Pamela let out a louder, heartier laugh, "Yeah, two people who are dead inside drowning their sorrows in each other and alcohol." She dragged her head up, looking into Keith's eyes. She found a calming and serenity that she had never noticed before. "Must be fate…" Pamela whispered.

Keith had also been brought into the stare, not realizing until now how close he was to Pamela, "Must be…" He replied softly, before leaning in slowly and meeting her lips with his own.

Pamela didn't care if she was only doing this because she was vulnerable. In fact, she didn't care about any of the reasoning behind it at all. All she cared about this moment right here, on the roof. She laid a hand on his shoulder, moving closer and deepening the kiss before realizing that his hand was smoothly going up her thigh. She let out a moan in protest, pushing him away a little, "Stop… We can't do this… I mean… Oh, screw it!" She growled, grabbing the collar of his t-shirt and pulling him back into the kiss.

* * *

Phoebe rubbed the back of her neck as she sat in front of her laptop, letting out a tired sigh before pushing her glasses back up her nose and looking at the empty word document in front of her. "Dear Lonely in Lombard…" She said to herself, beginning to type, "Life sucks…" She spat to herself, rapidly pressing the backspace key and deleting what she had just typed, taking off her glasses and raking a hand through her hair. 

It was still raining outside. Small streams of water run down the dining room window, impairing the view of the street outside which only had a few flickering streetlamps on the sidewalks to illuminate it. Everything seemed so dark and cold. Phoebe figured it was all part of living in Suburbia. When it was a hot summer's day, everyone was friends with everyone. Kids would play out in the street, riding bikes up and down the road, while neighbours tended to their gardens, giving each other big beaming smiles along the way, but on a wet night like this, everything seemed so gloomy.

There was a creak on the stairs. Phoebe turned her head, a psionic globe of energy hovering above her eyes and lighting up her tired features. Another creak, and another… She got up, gripping the back of the dining table chair she had been sitting in, all the while the white light on her head growing with each second before her husband appeared at the bottom of the stairs, clad in a plain white t-shirt and navy blue boxers. The light above her head immediately dissipated and her shoulders relaxed, "Brennan!" She hissed, sitting back down, "When you're coming down the stairs, don't creep like you're a demon who's trying to sneak up on me, please."

"Sorry, sorry." He said sincerely with a smirk on his face, "I guess living on your own makes you kinda jumpy, huh?" He asked, beginning to walk towards her as he talked.

She smiled in return, "Yeah, but then again, twelve and a half years of demons breaking down your door every week also teaches you to be a little careful. What woke you up?" She asked, looking up as he stood next to her.

"Uh… The storm." Brennan began to explain, "I was gonna turn over and go back to sleep, but then I saw you weren't in bed and I came down to check on you." He laid a hand on her shoulder, "What are you doing up anyway? You should be getting some rest. You and Paige have been looking after Piper non-stop for the last week." The mutant pointed out, making his wife let out a small laugh.

"Yeah, that's the consequence of having coffee non-stop for a week as your only energy source. It's completely screwed up my sleeping habits. I'm turning nocturnal. I fell asleep on the couch in my office today so Elise sent me home to work. This is for tomo… Oh, wait." She narrowed her eyes at the clock in the corner of the screen, "Make that today's evening edition… And I've wrote nothing."

"You need any help?" Brennan asked, moving behind her and beginning to slowly and gently rub her shoulders. "Dear Lonely in Lombard… I have three words for you. Get. A. Dog." He advised, smiling when he could feel the tension draining from his Phoebe's shoulders with his light-hearted attitude, "Okay, gimme another! I'm on a roll." He announced, increasing the pressure on her shoulders a little.

"Hmm…?" She grumbled, opening her eyes from the trance-like state she had fell into in front of her computer, "Oh, yeah, maybe you should do this. My head is killing me and this computer probably isn't helping…" She joked, putting her hand to her forehead and rubbing it slightly.

Brennan raised his eyebrows, "Well then, I guess there's only one thing we should do." He announced, taking control of the mouse and quickly shutting down the document and the computer, earning a gasp in protest from Phoebe when realized what he had done, "Relax, you had written two lines, and you were about to delete them anyway." He pointed out, going back to rubbing her shoulders, "You're pregnant, you should be listening to your body. When it tells you to stop, you grind to a halt that very second,"

"Uh huh…" Phoebe absentmindedly replied, leaning back and enjoying her massage, "Hey… Could you please get me a cup of chamomile tea, please? It'll help with my headache and hopefully make me at least a little sleepy." She asked, putting her hand over his and smiling.

"Absolutely." He replied, leaning down and kissing the top of her head before leaving her side and walking towards the kitchen, not even noticing the confused look on his wife's back as she watched him leave. Brennan always slept through storms. It was where Connor got it from. What was different about tonight? "Is there anything else you want?" He called back as quietly as he could, not wanting to wake up his son.

"No thanks, I'm… Actually, do we have any of those fudge mint covered Oreos left?" She asked with pursed lips, trying to hide the fact that her cravings had began to kick in and that she had eaten an entire box of the cookies that afternoon.

Phoebe heard him rummaging around in the kitchen, going through all the cupboards and the refrigerator before appearing at the doorway, placing his hand on the side of the archway. "Nope, we're all out… which is weird, seeing as how I went grocery shopping yesterday…" Brennan mused, his brow furrowing in thought. "But I'll go out and get you some."

"What? Are you kidding me?" Phoebe explained, snapping her powered down laptop shut and placing her arms on the glass table, "It is twelve thirty at night. Where are you going to find a store that's open _and_ sells Oreos?" She asked, her jaw hitting the floor as she watched Brennan walk back through the living room and grin at her on his way up the stairs. "What the hell?"

* * *

Aidan gritted his teeth as he bore the pain of using his complete physical strength to open the small tub of pills. The symbol etched into his chest had still not fully healed, and was only now beginning to make progress, thanks to stitches from a friend of Brennan's at the hospital, who had agreed not to ask any questions as to how the elemental had acquired such an injury. He let out a breath when the lid finally came off, wincing at the pain now running through his upper body and hobbling over to the dining room table. 

The elemental let out a sigh as he sat down; smiling to himself at the slight elevation in comfort that it brought him. He went to take the pain killers, before realizing that he completely forgot to pour himself a glass of water. Aidan groaned, propping up his head in his hand as his elbow lent against the table. He really didn't to get up again, but if he didn't, he would have to swallow these pills dry, and he hated doing that.

The shuffling of someone's feet caught his ears, and immediately Aidan knew it was Paige. She appeared in the doorway, her hair askew in its normal fashion from when she had slept for a few hours. "Aidan, what are you doing up?" She asked with a sympathetic tone, knowing that her husband had been in pain for a full week now. The witchlighter looked at the container Aidan held in his hand and smiled, "You weren't going to take those dry, were you? I know you hate that."

He nervously tapped his index finger of the table, "Actually, I was just sitting here wondering if a glass of water was worth getting up for, I still haven't decided." He smiled sadly, picking up the tub and shaking two pills out of it, staring at them for a few seconds before beginning to raise them to his mouth, but his wife stopped him.

"Relax…" Paige urged, giving him a loving smile as she reached for a glass from one of the shelves the twins couldn't reach, "I'll get you some water." She walked towards the sink, quickly filling the glass with water and turning off the tap, before looking out the window, "Boy, the rain is bouncing off the decking tonight."

"Yeah." Aidan agreed as she sat down next to him handing him the water, "It started around eleven and just hasn't stopped." He rolled his eyes when Paige looked at him with a stern expression, "Please don't give me that look. I'm more comfortable sitting down than lying down, and I'm really not that tired."

"I can't believe you haven't gone to bed." Paige said, looking at what was on the table, "Although I guess this explains the flashlight, the glasses, and your worn copy of the Da Vinci Code… For as long as I've known you, you've read that book like, six times a year. It any good?"

The elemental smiled, "It's a good read. You should try it sometime." He suggested, putting both of the pills in his mouth before taking a large sip of water, swallowing the medicine and silently hoping it would help.

"No thanks, the extent of my reading goes as far as reading Harry Potter to the twins before bed time." Paige joked, smiling as she folded her arms and put her feet up on the edge of Aidan's chair, "Do you need anything?" She asked quietly, feeling the usual air of tension that had been surrounding their relationship recently. "I mean, I'm not going back to sleep anytime soon. Too much…" She raised her hand over her mouth, yawning, "Coffee…"

Aidan smiled slightly, taking another sip of his water and seeing right through her lie, "I thought you had to go into work early tomorrow." He asked, watching as Paige looked to the side and pouted her lips in a way that confirmed she was not telling the truth about her fatigue. "Paige, go back to bed. You shouldn't run yourself into the ground any more than you have."

"I'm fine." Paige protested calmly, "I'm not the one with a pentagram carved into my chest. Speaking of which…" She laid her hand on his chest, a soft golden glow igniting from her palm and bringing Aidan momentary relief from the pain that was coursing through his upper body. "By the way, I've been doing some research into that symbol, and it's a lot more than a pentagram…" She announced; the light vanishing from her hand as she kept it where it was, smiling nervously before pulling away.

"Oh? What is it?" He asked curiously, taking a sip and reveling in the relief that Paige's healing power brought to him. He took another sip of his water, staring at it with a sad expression, "Did you find out why it took my powers?"

"I think so…" She replied, bringing her legs up around her and hugging her knees, "It's a banishment symbol for water. But I think in this case, Diam somehow used it to get your powers out of your body, and instead of sending them off to oblivion, he used them to open the crypt… Whatever was in there…" She mumbled, thinking of her missing broth in law with a tearful glance to the floor.

"Has Piper even talked about what she saw? He may not be dead…" Aidan murmured, trying to comfort her verbally, as any physical contact would probably cause him blinding pain. "You don't know what happened in that crypt and I doubt Diam would have gone in if it had been something that would endanger him."

"Yeah… it may not harm Diam, but Leo's nowhere near as powerful as powerful as him. If it was something dangerous, there's a good chance that it…" She gulped loudly, before clearing her throat and trying to smile, "… So anyway, I found a counter symbol for the water banishing one; it would invoke some higher energy and restore your powers. The bad news is that it involves cutting an arrow into your chest over the original one, except this time it would face the opposite direction. Unless Satus can restore them?" She suggested with a hopeful tone, not wanting to have to cut her husband.

Aidan chuckled slightly at the notion of calling for the spirit elemental's help on the matter, "Paige, it doesn't really work like that…. If you lose your powers, you don't exactly go and get another set, do you? Besides, Satus isn't very approachable, as Piper could probably tell you."

"Then what do we do?" She asked with her voice just above a whisper.

He shrugged in response, "Talk?"

* * *

_White. All she could see was white. She had to still be in the cavern, she could hear the echoing clomp of her boots against the hard ground, which was the only reassurance Piper had that she hadn't been transported into another realm or plane. She took another cautious step into the white, hearing her boots against the floor once again as she looked around for anything that would tell her where she was. The witch's ears twitched when a low whispering was picked up by her hearing. She narrowed her eyes, trying to focus all her energy on deciphering the sound, before there was a white flash, and the blinding white around her began to ripple and fade, letting grey stone bleed through and slowly reveal Diam's location._

_It was another cave, except this one was covered in the elaborate markings that had only been on the door outside before. The dome ceiling, on closer inspection, seemed to depict an ancient battle between good evil, with various angelic creatures sitting in the clouds on one side, and a host of imps, demons and another evil beings clambering and crawling around jagged stalagmites while staring at the their counterparts with hatred. The floor was made from stone, just like Piper had suspected, except bright light shone through the cracks of each slab, making her think that this chamber had been built around her, and that the endless white was still outside._

"_Just a little longer…" Diam murmured to a floating item in the centre of the room, "All I need is a little more time and I will have acquired all their powers, if you were perhaps to give me a little more power-," The being suddenly fell his knees in front of the floating object, which unfortunately, was blocked from Piper's memory for some reason. Diam was shaking, his head almost on the floor as he bowed, "You're right… Forgive me."_

"_Oh my God…" Piper breathed, looking towards the floating object in the centre of the room, her eyes wide with horror and realization as she stared at it. "I know what you are now." She said a little louder, making her presence known._

_Diam's head spun around so fast that Piper had thought his neck had snapped. He brought himself to his full height, looking at the witch with fierce contempt, "You really shouldn't have come in here, Piper. You could have lived, but now you'll have to pay the price for your arrogance!" He hissed, wheeling his arm back as a sizzling neon blue energy ball appeared in his hand, before he threw it forward, only for it to blow up halfway from the effect of Piper's power and knock both combatants to the floor with the resulting shockwave. "Flee, Master!" Diam shouted to the object, making it vanish in a flash of white light that momentarily blinded Piper from its intensity._

"_No!" The eldest Charmed One bellowed, her sight a collection of multicoloured spots as she forced herself to her feet, narrowing her eyes towards Diam as her eyes started to recover from the assault they had braved, "I know what you are! We'll kill you; I swear to God, we'll kill you!" _

_At this notion, Diam laughed heartily in her face, "Three measly witches? Even with all magic united, all they could do was seal my master away, what makes you think the 'mighty' Power of Three will do anything?" An energy ball crackled in his palm, he smirked at the witch's fear, "Especially if it's down to the Power of Two…"_

_But before he could fire his projectile, a powerful tesla coil hit him the side, the lightning making the entire room flash with its intensity as it threw Diam against the wall, his clothes still smoking the attack. Leo coolly lowered his hand back to his side, glaring at the bald being with hate as the residual orbs left by his entrance fizzled out. "Piper, you have to get out of here…" He breathed, keeping one eye on his enemy to make sure he didn't recover too soon._

"_Leo, what are you talking about? Where did you even come from?" Piper asked with perplexed expression, wanting to know how her husband had known to orb to her at this precise moment and place. "And if I have to get out of here, so do you. Let's go!' She urged, holding her hand out to take his, "I know what we're fighting! It's the-,"_

_Before she could even finish her sentence, Leo had made a gesture towards her, causing a cloud of orbs to sweep her up from her ankles and consume her entire body, lifting her up and away from the battle, "I love you." Leo called out as the swathe of orbs flew out of the chamber._

_Piper couldn't see what Diam did; she was too focused on the aftermath of what he had done. Leo had out a piercing roar of pain, before bursting into a column of orbs that quickly dissipated, flying in every direction through the walls of the dome cavern and vanishing completely, "Leo! LEO!"_

"Leo!" Piper called out as she suddenly woke up, sitting bolt up right in her bed with a cold sweat giving her skin a sheen in the pale streetlamp light that was streaming through her rain beaten bedroom window. Annabelle jumped back and off the bed in surprise. She had been trying to wake Piper up for the past five minutes to no avail, until now.

"Um… You guys?" The blonde said timidly to the three children standing in the doorway. Chris and Lorna each with red, puffy eyes from large sessions of crying, while Wyatt just stared up at their houseguest with an empty expression, "Why don't you all go back to bed? I need to talk to your Mom for a minute…" She gently requested of the fragile trio, thankful when they turned on their heels and headed back to their rooms.

"Why are you in here?" Piper asked, throwing the covers off herself and getting out of bed, walking towards the window and watching the rain come down.

Annabelle gently closed the door over, turning towards Piper and folding her arms, "I was up late beating the crap out of my punching bag and I heard you screaming his name…" She walked a little closer to the eldest Charmed One, but keeping a safe distance so she didn't feel suffocated, "Was it the dream again? Maybe you should tell your sisters."

"No way." Piper replied immediately, "They coddle me enough in the day; the last thing I want or need is a night watch. The kids think I'm in a wreck as it is… Phoebe and Paige would worry too much. Hell, you're worried and you don't really even give a crap." She droned, not turning around to face the mercenary.

"That's not true." Annabelle said, sounding slightly hurt. She walked up to the window, sitting down on the ledge and looking up to Piper, "Did you see anything new tonight?" She asked with narrowed eyes, knowing that the eldest Halliwell sister had been seeing more and more of what had happened in the crypt.

The witch shook her head, "No, it was the same as last night." She ran a hand through her hair, "It's so frustrating! I knew what Diam was talking to; I knew how we could fight it, how we could end it, but as soon as I left that chamber… It all just vanished from my memory." She tightened her hands into fists, biting down on her bottom lip, "Damnit."

"You should try and get some sleep. Don't you have to meet with the architect tomorrow for the final arrangements for the restaurant?"

Piper shook her head vigorously, "No. There's no way I can get back to sleep now… Not after getting so close to figuring this out." She said, biting her thumbnail as she said sitting down on her bed and getting a distant look as she went over her dream again. "The one time they were useful, and it cost Leo his life."

"Piper… The Elders foresaw that Diam was going to kill you… Do you really think Leo would have just stayed put even if they had tried to stop him? He was meant to save you, so you could stop whatever's being blocked from your memory." Annabelle said, trying to comfort her, "It was his-,"

"Oh God, you better not end that sentence with the D word." The eldest Charmed One warned, looking towards the blonde. "Look, you go back to bed. I do not really want to fight demons, so you need to be full of energy for any attack…" She said lowly, looking towards the fireplace in her room, staring at the dwindling flames from when she had lit it before going to bed.

"I don't need sleep." Annabelle replied monotonously, heading for the bedroom door, "Misery loves company. I'll be right back with some hot chocolate." She said in such a serious tone that it the sentence sounded rather silly. As the blonde passed the bedroom door, she made a small gesture at the dying fire in the wall. The flames instantly sprouted up with renewed life, bathing the room in warmth and light as she left, leaving Piper with a confused expression on her face.

* * *

"You're soaking!" Phoebe exclaimed as Brennan sat down across from her in the living room, his hair practically sticking to his head and his clothes completely soaked through. "Brennan, you really didn't have to go out and get these. I could have waited until the rain went off, or, you know, a sane hour." She said sarcastically, her lips forming a tight smile as she tore open the packet of cookies. "… But thank you nonetheless." 

Brennan smiled at her, "You're welcome…" He said softly, before the mutant's eyes widened in realization, "Oh, crap! I didn't get you the chamomile tea before I left, I'm sorry." He said so sincerely that Phoebe had to wonder if he was being serious. It turned he was however, as he jumped to his feet, heading to the kitchen.

"Sweetie, relax." The middle Charmed requested, gesturing to the cup sitting on the coffee table in front of her. "I got it for myself while you were out. I am capable of making a cup of tea, you know." She said, giving him a perplexed glance as he sat down next to her on the sofa. "What is up with you?" She asked, taking a bite of her Oreo.

"Nothing. I'm just making sure you're comfortable. You are carrying my little girl after all." Brennan replied, beaming with pride as he put a hand on his wife's stomach and give her a kiss on the cheek. "I'm just making sure that I do the best I can for you when I'm here, so you don't completely forget about me when I'm not here." He explained meekly.

Phoebe suppressed the smile that was threatening to emerge, as she thought it would be rather hurtful to laugh at her husband's insecurities. The smile instantly vanished when she realized that there had been a time where she had forgot about him, and only through a sudden burst of self-control had she regained her common sense. "I love you." She said simply, taking his hand and smiling when he squeezed it gently, "… But I'm not going to lie to you. At times, I find our situation _really_ trying. It all comes down to whether we trust each other enough. You're a good looking guy, how do I know you're not sleeping with some hot twenty-something doctor while you're wife sits on the couch, eating Oreos?" She looked down from his offended stare, trying to think of a way to recover her point, "And the same applies to me. I could be with some other guy. Hell, for all you could know, this baby isn't even yours!"

"Phoebe, I gotta tell you. You're not exactly doing the best job at calming me down right now." Brennan said, gripping her hand firmly in both of his, "The baby _is_ mine, isn't it?" He asked, looking into her eyes, "Because you should just tell me right now and-,"

The middle Charmed One glared at him and hit him on the arm, "You idiot, of course it's yours! This is the point I'm trying to make. We love each other, we have a happy marriage, but when we have to fit our entire relationship and everything we're feeling into a few weeks, everything just gets messed up, and… Sometimes, it just would be easier to take the home option… And with everything that's happened with Leo, it's made a little antsy about holding on to you." She shuffled a little closer to him, putting her head on his shoulder, "I don't want to lose you…"

"I'm not going anywhere…" He said strongly, planting a kiss on her head and frowning when he heard her let out a small laugh, as she knew that he had to leave in a week. "No, I mean it. I'm gonna take a year off or something and go back to my old job. I don't want to lose you, and I want to be around for you, Connor, and our baby." He said, putting an arm around her shoulders and pulling her closer to him. "I love you."

The light pattering of footsteps brought their attention to the stairs; Connor was slowly making his way down them, holding onto railings on the banister as he wasn't yet tall enough to reach the actual support railing. He was holding onto the navy blue teddy bear that he had had since birth, given to him by his godmother, Lexa. "Daddy? Mommy? Watchoo guys doin' awake?" He questioned with a curious pout.

"Uh…" Phoebe brought her head up from Brennan's shoulder, smiling at her son. "Just talking. Come here." She held out her arms as Connor walked over to them and clambered onto the sofa, onto his mother's lap, "Guess what?" She said excitedly, looking at Brennan, "Your dad's going to be staying around a whole lot more from now on!"

The toddler's face instantly lit up as any drowsiness he was suffering from suddenly vanished with excitement, "Daddy's staying?" He asked, looking to his mother for confirmation and beaming when she nodded, "Yay!" He exclaimed, leaping off Phoebe's lap onto Brennan, who wrapped his arms around his son with a grin on his face that really did show they were related.

"Yeah, big guy! I'm gonna take you to school, go to the park with you, and do all the stuff that your Mom can't do because she's too girly!" Brennan smirked at Phoebe, before going back to beaming at his son and ruffling his messy black-brown hair. "I'm glad I'm going to do this…" He said softly to his wife, leaning in and giving her a loving kiss on the lips and laughing at the face of disgust Connor pulled at the sight.

"Me too." Phoebe replied, smiling at the two most important guys in her life before casually turning to the window and almost jumping out of her skin at what she saw. "Brennan! Brennan!" She whispered frantically, hitting him on the shoulder and trying to get him to turn to the window. The middle Charmed One raised a shaky finger towards what she was seeing, her bottom lip trembling with fear, "Look…"

A man stood underneath one of the flickering streetlamps outside. The couple's view was already impaired from the rain beaten window, but they could definitely make out a figure. His face would be momentarily illuminated in the amber glow from the light, before vanishing again into the darkness. When the light came back on, they could see that it only seemed to be half of the man, half of his body had… faded away, leaving the his left side just a misty column next to him. The streetlamp died again, before flicking back to life for a brief moment, and it was in this moment where Phoebe finally recognized him.

"Leo…?"

* * *

Paige grabbed the empty glass from the table, wanting to keep on top of the washing up so she didn't end with a pile to do at any one time. She walked towards the sink, laying the glass down and picking up her own glass of milk, hoping that it would make her a little drowsier. She looked out towards the window, shaking her head at the rain while inadvertently moving her hand closer to the empty glass and knocking it off the counter. The witchlighter let out a gasp as she realized what she had just done, cringing as she waited for the smash. She waited a few seconds, before looking down and seeing that the glass was suspended in mid-air, almost touching the floor. "Power advancements rock…" She whispered to herself, bending down and picking up the levitating glass, putting back on the counter, far away the edge. 

"What are you watching?" Paige asked with a sneer as she sat down on the couch next to Aidan, watching as the people on the television gaped in amazement at something she assumed was off screen.

"Magic Bullet infomercial. I do believe that damn thing is plotting to take over television as we know it." Aidan shook his head in disgust, having never been a fan of commercials or infomercials.

"Yeah, well, as long as it doesn't take over 24, Survivor, or C.S.I., I'll be happy." Paige said, leaning towards the coffee table and grabbing the remote, turning off the television. She shrugged at her husband's confused, "You said we should talk, so what better time than at two o'clock in the morning when neither of us can sleep?" She perked, smiling.

"Well, there's only one thing I want to talk about right now, and you'll probably want to avoid the entire issue, but…" He looked up into her eyes, frowning with confusion, "Why did you go to New York instead of staying here and maybe sorting out our problems?" He asked, "I mean, it's not as if I'm dangerous. I wouldn't have hurt you or anything like that… There was no need to run away."

Paige looked down at her lap, picking at her cuticles as she bit her lip, "I don't know why I left… I think I was afraid that, if I stayed and we confronted our problems, we would find out that we couldn't overcome them and that would inevitably lead to us going our separate ways. I couldn't handle that…" She finished her explanation in a whispered, before looking up and grinning, "Well, that and I wanted to see Pam's apartment. And lemme tell you, those mutants in the underground have nothing to be sad about. Her place is amazing! We should go as a family sometime. Although she has a new roommate coming in soon so-,"

"Paige." Aidan said simply, cutting off the youngest Charmed One mid-rant, "What made you think that we wouldn't be able to sort things out? God knows we've overcome a hell of a lot worse than a marital squabble. Why did you think it would end us?" The elemental asked, his eyes narrowing with curiosity about his wife's methods.

"Relationships are fragile." She countered, "Just because we've survived magic screwing with us, doesn't mean something normal won't get to us. It's always the thing you last suspect." She fell back onto the sofa completely, letting out a sigh, "But when I felt you calling to me when you were dying in the crypt… It made me realize that the only thing standing in the way of our happiness was… well, us."

Aidan twisted his torso slightly so he was facing her, wincing from the pain it caused, "Then about we make a little pact? Everything, apart from the kids and the marriage, is void. We start off with a clean slate, bury the hatchet, live and let live… No grudges, no arguments, just starting from the beginning again, making like it was when we first got together."

Paige looked to the ceiling, mulling the notion over, "From I remember, the start of our relationship was basically sound and fury signifying jack." She joked, "We were passionate, but that all seemed to burn out, don't you agree?"

He nodded, "Yeah, but after the starting passion had burnt out, we were left with an actual relationship. The embers if you will." He smirked, deciding to go along with the fire analogy, "And for me, personally, the embers turned out to be the best part."

Paige smiled, clearly agreeing with him, "You better not laugh at me for saying this… But, after the first three months or so of our relationship, spending time with you was all I needed. Sure, we both rocked in the sex department, but that was just an added bonus." She looked up at him, taking his hand, "How about we don't start from the beginning? We start from the embers."

Aidan gave her a little smile in response, cupping her cheek in his hand, "Sounds good to me…" He leaned in, engaging her in a long kiss that made her sit up properly and lay her hands gently on his shoulders. Before they could take it any further, the sound of rumbling thunder made them break apart in surprise, "Jeez, I would have thought we'd be getting unseasonable warmth with my powers gone, not rain all the time."

That one sentence made Paige jumped from the sofa, "Oh my God! That's it!" She exclaimed, pulling on Aidan's hand and dragging him to his feet. "When did you last go outside? Have you been out in the rain like, at all?" Her eyes widened even further when he shook his head, "Aidan, don't you get it? Your powers were released! They're what's causing the weather!" She said, dragging him towards the kitchen as she headed towards the back door.

"Paige, what are you doing?" Aidan asked, but before he knew it, the witchlighter had pulled the back door open and threw him out into the back yard, his bare feet squelching in the wet grass from all the rain, "Have you lost your mind? It's freezing out here! And it's a swamp!" He said, grimacing as he felt his feet sink into the mud.

"I've always told you that you should wear more to bed!" Paige smirked from the doorway, watching with amazement at how quickly the rain made Aidan's t-shirt and boxers stick to his skin. "I knew it…" She whispered, smiling at the wonder that was beginning to take place before her.

As each rain drop fell against Aidan's skin, the small pool of water would be replaced by a tiny dot of blue. The rain continued to fall on him, continuing to have the same effect, covering the elemental in glowing dots that bathed his body in a celestial aura. More light began to gather, and each dot began to glow with a fiercer shine before the blue had completely covered Aidan's person. He looked up towards the sky, relishing in the feeling the rain was giving him as it restored his powers. Aidan continued to up at the sky, before an odd sensation across his chest made look down to witness a pentagram draw itself across him in a harsh aquamarine light, before a bright blue arrow cut across the top point, pointing in the opposite direction the one that was etched into his skin. The symbol shone brightly in the night, as if it was a star into the stormy darkness.

Paige watched as the rain's intensity began to decrease, becoming a light drizzle before stopping completely, leaving the two within the calm of the night, now that the elements had been restored.

Aidan fell to his knees from the power overload that his body had just experienced. There was no pain in his chest anymore. To make sure, he pulled at the collar of his soaking t-shirt and looking down, smiling when the pentagram like symbol was no longer carved into his skin, he was completely healed.

"Oh my God!" Paige exclaimed, clamping a hand over her mouth and looking to the bottom of the garden with wide eyes full of terror and confusion.

"What is it?" Aidan asked, getting back up and running back to the back door, joining his wife in the archway and looking to where he trailed her eyesight, "Paige, what is it? What do you see?" He asked, confused. All he could see was the large tree that sat at the bottom of the garden, with the wooden swing swaying gently in the after-storm breeze.

"He was there…" She said, moving closer to her husband for comfort.

"Who was?"

"Leo." Paige replied simply, making Aidan's heart skip a beat, knowing full well the fate of his brother in law. "He was sitting on the swing. But… something was different… He didn't look right… He looked really… _really_ scary. Skeletal even…" She murmured, flinching slightly as Aidan put his arms around her. "You believe me, don't you? Please say you do. I know what I saw."

"Shh…" He calmed her down, pulling her into a tight hug and kissing the top of her head. "I believe you…" He assured, knowing full well that things like this were more than likely to be real in this family, "Question is, what does it mean?" He asked, looking out towards the swing and seeing nothing out of the ordinary.

"I don't know…" Paige whispered in response, "But I never want to see that again… Whatever it was…" She said, giving another look towards the swing with fearful eyes before walking back into the house with Aidan. She closed over the door, giving one last glance out towards the tree at the bottom of the garden, a shiver running down her spine as she did.

It had always creeped her out.

* * *

"I didn't know pyrotechnics were your thing." Piper said lowly as Annabelle handed her the mug of hot chocolate. "The fire. I saw what you did before you left the room." She said, nodding to the now roaring flames as the blonde sat down on the thick rug on the floor, smiling slightly at the warmth she was feeling from the fire. "Is this just another thing that's going to remain a mystery?" 

"What part of me _hasn't_ remained a mystery?" Annabelle joked, crossing her legs and wrapping both hands around her hot chocolate, "Because if you know something, then I've screwed up." She said, before rolling her eyes at Piper's look of caution. "Relax. I'm not to be starting fires anytime soon, I can only control their intensity and cause them to contract or expand, not make it appear out of nowhere." She held up her wrist, showing off the crimson red tattoo of a phoenix, "Just one of the little perks I get for having one of these."

"So, that makes you a witch, right?" Piper asked, taking a sip from the big obscure mug that Wyatt had made for her, "I mean, Phoenixes' are classed as a coven of assassin witches in the Book of Shadows, so where did you stray off the path and end up a mercenary?" She inquired, reveling in the warmth the renewed fire brought to the room.

"Maybe because I was never on that path to begin with?" She suggested with a droll tone, taking a sip from her beverage, "It's a really long story; I would only bore you to sleep, so forget about it."

"Well, right now, I can't sleep, so I guess I have time for a long story, and if I get so bored that I fall asleep, that'll be an added bonus." She smirked, "Come on, just tell me how you got the tattoo. I'm assuming you've had it from birth?" Piper asked an eyebrow raised, watching as Annabelle's lips formed a tight smile.

"Well, in this case, your assumption is wrong. I would like to take this time to point out that you really never should make assumptions with magic. There are usually around a dozen explanations for one thing." She looked down at the tattoo, glaring at it with a hateful passion before looking up, "… Not all Phoenixes are born into the coven, you know. Some are mortals, trained to the bone, before finally receiving powers…"

"Are you the latter?"

Annabelle smirked, "However did you guess?" She said sarcastically, continuing her story, "I was pretty athletic in college, I taught a tae kwon doe class on campus, and I would go for a five mile run every morning." Her gaze became distant, as if she was trying to recall an old, dormant, memory, "They came for me in the middle of the night. I had never stood a chance. I remember being astounded at how elegantly and stealthily they moved when capturing me. It only took them a few seconds too, it was amazing." She ran her finger around the edge of her cup, biting her lip, "Well, let's just say four years of constant training of how to be a killer can change you. You had to be at the top of your fitness, your senses had to be tuned, everything had to be at its peak before a Phoenix was chosen to share their blood with you, therefore giving you the powers that you had trained for."

"Sounds pretty intense…" Piper murmured, still holding onto every word the mercenary spoke.

"It was." Annabelle replied darkly, pulling her top up slightly and revealing deep purple bruises across her sides and abdomens. "One day, I just got sick of it. Being forced into training non-stop with barbarians for instructors… So that night, I slipped a sleeping potion into the Phoenix Lord's drink – they taught us magic we could use without powers – and I performed the blood sharing ritual myself, copying his powers. I fled that night, and have never looked back."

"Wow, you must have been really good to have taken the leader's powers, and mastered them so damn quickly. I'm surprised you left, wouldn't have loved their top student?" Piper asked, wanting to know more, as this was the first time Annabelle had said anything about her past.

The blonde shrugged in response, "Well, they taught you all the mental abilities you needed to control powers before you actually got them, although it did a few tries for me to particle out of the Underworld. But as you can see…" She held her arms out, pouting, "… I did get out. And that ends tonight's installment of 'The Annabelle Chronicles'. Are you happy now?"

Piper shrugged in response, "For now."

They both smiled at each other, taking sips from their hot chocolate before sitting in silence, nothing but the crackling of the fire behind Annabelle to break the calm. "But anyway, how did we end up talking about me? This is supposed to be about you." She said softly, not sure how to approach the situation, "Listen, don't take this the wrong way, but… You don't seem _that_ upset about… you know."

At this accusation, Piper looked down at her mug, "To be honest, I've been trying to shove it out my mind. Combine that with this empty, enveloping… numbness that I'm feeling, and I come across pretty much heartless." She looked up and past Annabelle, staring into the fire, "It all happened so fast… All these emotions just hit me and I froze…"

"… But that's not healthy." Annabelle said quietly, "You're going to have to face up to the fact that he's-," She was suddenly cut off when she let out a gasp, making Piper jump a little in shock, before she was suddenly thrown into darkness as the fire was blown out by an unknown source, leaving her to watch as the wind circled around Annabelle. Her hair was being gently swayed in the spiritual breeze while her eyes were closed in deep concentration, "Piper…" She whispered in a voice that made the eldest Charmed One shiver with its familiarity, "Help me…"

"L-Leo?" She breathed back, her eyes going wide as she looked around the room, seeing if there was any other sign of her husband in the room.

Annabelle let out another desperate gasp for air as her head drooped down.. Her chest heaved as she tried to take a breath, as if her being had been denied of oxygen during her possession. She looked up, seeing that her hot chocolate had spilled out onto the rug, "Oh, sorry…" She said, before realizing that they were sitting in darkness and seeing that the fire had gone out, "What the hell just happened?"

* * *


	12. Reach For The Skylark

**Reach For The Skylark**

The trees around Camp Skylark swayed in the strong wind that had suddenly picked up around an enclosed space on the dusty path that led up to a cabin that had not been used in over ten years. The sun shone through the gaps in the branches, casting ever changing shadows onto the path that shifted along with the shaking tree in the breeze, making the ground almost sparkle as sunlight was magnified by tiny reflective minerals in the minuscule stones that were all over the dirt road. The eerie calm didn't last however, as the cause of the sudden increase in intensity of the wind was revealed as a tornado of bright, swirling spheres of light began to fade into view on the path. The two funnels of mystical starbursts grew strong, before slowly vanishing and leaving Piper and Phoebe standing in their place.

The younger of the two immediately squinted, adjusting to the sudden change from dark attic to bright outdoors. She put her hand on her forehead, shielding her eyes as best she could as she looked around, instantly recognizing this place as the spot they had stood on when Leo had revealed that Sam Wilder had been their mother's whitelighter, and therefore Paige's father. "Okay, we cast a spell to find Leo, and this is what we get?" She asked, shrugging, before looking towards Piper.

The eldest Charmed One's face scrunched up in frustration. This had been the only spell in the past month that had actually shown signs of working, and now it had backfired? She didn't want to believe it. "Well, water is a spiritual symbol of transition, so maybe Leo's finding some way to hold on here?" She offered, "Or, you know, the spell backfired. Wouldn't that be a rarity?" She asked rhetorically in a sarcastic tone, giving her younger sister an empty smile. She was extremely disappointed, and even someone who wasn't an empath like Phoebe would be able to tell.

Phoebe, not wanting to crush any remaining hope that her older sibling still had left, shrugged again, putting her hands on her hips. "Well… The spell brought us here for a reason, so why don't we go check it out?" She suggested, "Remember just to stay away from any plants. You don't want to be covered in poison ivy rashes when we find your husband!" She said with a large smile, putting her arm around her sister's shoulders and heading for the stairs that would take them down to the lake.

Piper had to admit, even though this lake had claimed her mother's life, it certainly was a sight to behold when caught in the morning. The sun was still creeping up behind the hills, only sending a thin line of golden light across the water's surface, making it glisten with majestic beauty that would probably even entice a hydrophobic like her older sister, Prue, into going for a swim. "Did I tell you I've got a name for the restaurant?" She said, trying to start up a conversation.

Phoebe's eyebrows rose with curiosity, "Oh? What is it?"

"Ah, ah, ah. You're going to have to wait until the opening, just like everyone else." Piper taunted, smiling at the bottom lip her younger sister was now protruding in a pleading manner. "I just thought I'd tell you to get your curiosity piqued." She admitted, frowning when she felt Phoebe link arms with her, "Are you alright? The last time we were here, you flew down these steps."

"Yeah, I'm fine. I'm just finding it a little hard to walk these days; I guess that's what comes from being five months along." She said, patting her stomach lovingly, "So I hope you don't mind if I lean on you for a while." Phoebe continued with a smile, looking down to make sure she wasn't about to miss a step.

"Are you kidding me? After the way I've been leaning on you for the past month, it's the least I can do." Piper replied with a grin, "And before you say anything, I'm fully aware that you were talking about leaning in the literal sense not in the emotional sense, but while we're being all warm and fuzzy… Thank you."

Phoebe smiled in return, bumping their shoulders together gently, "You're very welcome." She replied, before her expression grew dark very quickly as she turned towards the lake. "Whoa…" The witch breathed, tightening the link she had with her sister's arms as they neared the dreaded wooden dock on the edge of the lake.

"What is it?"

The middle Charmed One ignored Piper's question to stare into the murky water, which looked a lot less enchanting when they were this close, "I don't know, but it's familiar… like I've come across it before, whatever it is…" She said with her voice just above a whisper, "I can't tell if it's Leo before you ask…. But from what I'm sensing, it could be."

"Help! Somebody, help me!" Came the screams of a woman. Piper and Phoebe both looked out to where the water seemed to be disturbed and watched in horror as a young women, no older then twenty five, was pulled under the surface, flailing her arms one last time before being dragged down, heading for the bottom of the lake and leaving nothing but a few bubbles on the water.

Knowing that there was only one person that stood the slightest chance of helping the women, Piper began to walk to the edge of the dock, keeping an eye on the spot where the woman had vanished, "Aidan! Aidan!" She bellowed at the top of her lungs, her shouts echoing through the wide expanse of open area before realizing that, for once, her brother in law had made a prompt entrance right to her without her even noticing. "There!" She shouted, pointing out towards the lake where a hand broke through the surface for a short minute, before vanishing back into the depths.

"I got her!" Aidan assured her, seeing the hand shoot up from the water and quickly ridding himself his sneakers and socks, before taking off the t-shirt that was part of his fireman's uniform, leaving the elemental in just his jeans. Having known how to swim like a pro since his childhood, Aidan knew that the less clothes constricting your body, the more hydrodynamic you were. The minute his shirt left his torso, he dove into the water and had swam almost ten feet before his shirt had even hit the dock.

The instant Aidan dove into the water, he seemed to vanish, the only sign of him being there was when water seemed to move around an object that appeared not to be there. He had become one with the water, allowing him to travel the large expanse of the lake within a few seconds. He could feel the water rush past him as he cut through it like a torpedo, making a mental note to begin going for a swim in the morning, as he was immediately alert after just a few seconds in the cold water.

He could see the young woman flailing in the distance. Thankfully, she only appeared to be drowning, and there was nothing that he could see that was pulling her down. Aidan continued on his lightning-speed approach, before slowing down slightly when the women in front of him began to change shape.

Her young face began to contort as her cheekbones rose out above any other feature in her face. Her skin, already pale from being in the colder water, was drained of any remaining colour, leaving the woman with a sickly green tinge. These transformations continued to take place in front of Aidan's eyes before he was left treading water in front of a withered old woman with bushy auburn hair, dressed in a torn and severely deteriorated mint green dress.

Aidan looked at the creature with suspicion, his thoughts of this incident not being supernatural now immediately quashed, as a ghostly blue glow ignited within the women's hand. She flashed him a set of horridly crooked and misshapen teeth, before firing the projectile straight at the elemental's chest.

Piper and Phoebe both jumped in shock when Aidan suddenly broke the surface of the lake, flying into the air so high that he cleared the entire wide area of water, before landing hard on the sandy shore with a bone cracking thud, while blood started to pour from his head.

* * *

"Planning on dodging life's bullet once again today?" Jordann said with a smirk as Pamela walked down the hallway towards the kitchen, fully dressed after getting up so early and having a shower at six in the morning. "I'm guessing from your expression that you still haven't talked to Keith? Pam, it's been three weeks for God's sake!" She exclaimed, pouring out a cup of coffee as her roommate sat down at the counter.

The witch gave her a glare, "Shut it. I'll talk to him when I'm ready. Besides, the fact that he pulled a runner before I had even woke up is a hint that even the most moronic woman should be able to get." Pamela said meekly, "I pounced on him when I was upset, he felt obligated to go along, and now I've screwed everything up."

"Yeah, because that's the only reason he would sleep with you. You got him in a vice grip and screwed him against his will. You are clearly a sexual predator in disguise." The hare feral replied sarcastically, turning her head when two bagels popped up from the toaster, "Okay, I'll give you your space on the matter, but I'll tell you right now, the next time he calls, I am not covering. I always get my way with these things. You'll see." She smiled, cutting open the bagels and letting the steam out.

Pamela shrugged, pretending not to be bother as she took a sip of her coffee, "Fine. I'll just get our new roommate to cover for me. Hopefully she'll have a stronger stomach for deceit than you do. When is she going to get here, anyway? Thanks." She said, biting into the bagel that her friend had just put down in front of her.

"Any minute now," Jordann replied quickly, "Now, back to subject that you just pathetically tried to dodge-,"

The two of them turned towards the front door to where they could here the sounds of a key being used in the lock. Both girls suppressed a small laugh when they realized that the door was actually unlocked already and that the person outside, presumably their new roommate, was trying to unlock it. They heard a frustrated sigh outside, before there was a knock. "It's open!" Jordann shouted, hardly able to keep the amused grin off her face as she raised a coffee cup to her mouth, trying to cover up her face.

There was a muffled curse behind the door, before the knob turned and a girl barreled into the living room. Her loose black curls fell over her face as she taken aback by how easily the door had opened. She looked up at Pamela and Jordann, who smiled at her from their spots in the open plan kitchen, "Wow, and I was hoping that I wouldn't come off as a complete idiot on first glance, but hey, first impressions and all…" She sighed, wiping down her faded red jeans.

"Don't worry about it. That door is really flimsy these days. It used to be great, until a certain someone over here blasted it off its hinges with her mind…" Jordann smirked, looking over the counter to the Halliwell witch who rolled her eyes, clearly tired of hearing this story being retold.

"Hey! I could hear people moving around inside and since I had been told you weren't arriving until the next day, I automatically assumed the worst! It's not my fault you were walking by the door when it happened." Pamela said meekly in her defense before turning to the new arrival, "I think the point Jordann is trying to make is that you're not going to scar us for life with a less than great entrance. I'm Pam, the door destroyer."

"McKenzie." The girl introduced herself, smiling, before going back into the outside hallway and bringing in her two suitcases, "Wow, it's really humbling when you realize you can fit your entire life into two suitcases, isn't it?" She said, looking down at the two items of luggage with a sad look.

"Don't worry about it, McKenzie, one weekend of shopping with us fill probably fill up those cases in a heartbeat." Jordann said reassuringly, taking another sip of her coffee before hearing a groan from their new tenant.

"Just call me Mac." McKenzie requested with a nervous smile, putting her hands in her back pockets before having a proper look around her new home and letting out a whistle of amazement, "This place is great!" She looked down the corridor that led to the rest of my apartment, "I take it my room's down there?"

Pamela frowned at the assumption, "Room? Honey, I don't know what they told you, but you're sleeping on the couch." A tense silence passed by as McKenzie stared at the two girls in disbelieve before Pamela smiled, "I'm kidding! Yeah, your room's down there. Lemme help you with your stuff to make up for that poorly placed joke." She smirked, sliding off the stool and picking up one of the suitcases.

"We still need to talk about Keith, young lady!" Jordann shouted down the hallway, moving over to the sink with her empty plate and putting it in, adding to the load of dishes that was steadily mounting up.

"Bite me, Thumper." Pamela spat back with no real venom, knowing that the insults traded with Jordann were always in a playful tone.

"Who's Keith?" McKenzie asked with a frowned, wanting to get to know her new roommates as quickly as possible.

To her disappointment, she was treated to an eye roll, "Don't ask."

* * *

"Okay, we have Kappas… Mermen… Sirens… Sea Hags… Women in White …" Paige continued to rhyme off all the marine demons that she passed by as she flipped the pages of the Book of Shadows, absentmindedly chewing on a large piece of strawberry bubblegum. The youngest Charmed One let out a sigh, losing her momentum and passion for searching and going back to the beginning of the Demons section, her eyes bulging when she reached a certain, "Oh my God, there's a whole section dedicated to aquatic demons!"

Aidan stood up from the couch, a towel slung over his neck as his hair was still wet from the rescues he had attempted at the lake. "Maybe I should take over Book duty; I am the only person that saw the demon after all." He argued, gently moving his wife to the side and staring blankly at the open page for a few minutes, before stepping back. "Actually, on second thought, you do it."

Paige smirked, "Aidan, I know you're a little self-conscious about your glasses, but you really should be the one to do this. Like you said, you are the only one who saw the demon." She said, taking his hand and squeezing it gently, "Go home and go and get them. They're not going to think any less of you." She said in a low murmur, nodding to Piper, Phoebe and Brennan, who were crowded around the copper potion pot.

"Okay, I'll be back in a minute." He said, planting a quick kiss on her forehead before vanishing in a burst of glowing water that seeped through the floorboards before vanishing completely, leaving no moisture at all.

"Are you alright?" Brennan asked with a frown, rubbing his wife's back and deciding to inquire as to why she had been so quiet ever since Paige had orbed the four of them back from the lake. "You've hardly said a word since you got back…" He said softly, gently grabbing her wrist before she could throw another ingredient into the pot.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She replied absentmindedly, looking up at the mutant when he didn't let go of her wrist, "Really, I'm fine. I'm just a freaked out from being back at that lake and knowing that there's something demonic in there. Again." She groaned, going to put what she had in her hand into the pot before stopping, "What the hell am I doing? What am I making?" She asked herself, looking down into the pot to see what she had thrown in.

The three remaining people in the room shared worried looks with one another as Phoebe continued to look around with confusion written all over her face, "Um, Paige? You know that thing that you and Aidan have been working on? Why don't we go downstairs with the book and see if we can make a potion or something?" Piper suggested, giving a wide eyed look towards the door.

Paige caught on to the plan to leave Phoebe and Brennan alone and nodded. "Sure." She replied, closing the Book of Shadows over and tucking it under her arm, giving a supportive smile to Brennan and brushing her hand over Phoebe's shoulder in a loving manner before following her big sister downstairs, closing the door behind her.

Taking his wife's hand, Brennan dragged her away from the table and towards one of the attic's many uncomfortable sofas. He helped Phoebe to sit down, but only propping up her side of the couch with many pillows and trying to make it as comfortable as possible, "Phoebe, what's the matter?" He asked, sitting down across from her as she shifted a little on the mound of cushions she was perched upon.

The middle Charmed One let out a languid sigh, running her hands across her face. "Sometimes, I really wish I had Piper or Paige's powers. I mean, I know they're a lot more active and harder to control, but…" She looked down at her pregnant stomach, "I just wish that I could shut it all out."

"Is it your powers?"

She smiled ruefully, "Oh… I really don't know anymore. I just can't shake the feeling I got up at the lake." She said, picking at her fingers and looking down at her lap. "It was so familiar, it was warm, calming, safe… but then I was hit with another force, and it was so cold, and ruthless, and…" She let out a sigh, pressing her thumbs or her temples and cloaking her eyes with her hands, "There's a war of emotions going on inside my head, and I can't do a damn thing about it."

"Well…" Brennan began, shifting a little on the sofa, "Maybe there's something I can do?" He suggested, earning a look of confusion from Phoebe and made him let out a laugh, "Hey, I'm not the expert on empaths or emotions. Hell, I'm the last guy you should come to about feelings. But I do know a lot about you and how your powers screw up your head."

"Yeah, but you just can't-," She was cut off when Brennan suddenly put his hands on the sides of her face and brought his lips against hers, bringing her into a passionate kiss that she just seemed to fall into. Her shoulders as she began to relax, letting the tension that her powers had created drain from her system as her husband continued to kiss her deeply, before pulling away, making Phoebe let out a small moan at the loss of contact, "Wow…"

"Feel any better?" Brennan asked with a smile, letting his hands fall from her face and stroke her hair lovingly, before running them over her shoulders and onto her knees. "All you needed was a distraction." He said, still with a grin on his face that made Phoebe smile too. "I'll keep you sane… although I really shouldn't be taking on another full time job, but you're worth it."

Phoebe hit him playfully, before feeling a hearty kick inside her belly from the baby that she was carrying, "Okay, ow… Looks like she agrees with you." She smiled again, leaning in again before the sound of someone clearing their throat made her jump with surprise.

Aidan stood uncomfortably at the altar where the Book of Shadows usually sat. His cheeks were flaming with embarrassment just as much as Phoebe and Brennan's. "Um… Do you guys know where the book's gone?" He asked, clearing his throat again and trying to get a hold on his voice, thankful that his glasses provided some sort of barrier to direct eye contact.

"Um… yeah. Piper and Paige took it down…" Phoebe cut herself off, her eyes narrowing with anger as she got up from the sofa and walking slowly towards the closed attic door. She laid her hand on the door handle, before twisting it quickly and yanking the door open, causing Piper and Paige to lose their balance and tumble onto the attic floor, the Book of Shadows sliding across the floorboards in the process, "You guys were eavesdropping?"

Piper let out a nervous laugh, getting up off the floor. "No! Of course not. We were coming back up the stairs and were thoughtfully checking to make sure it was alright to come in. We wouldn't want to invade your privacy, would we, Paige?" She turned to her youngest sister for support as Paige walked across the room, placing the Book of Shadows back on the altar, allowing Aidan to begin searching for the demon.

"Sorry, dude. You're on your own." The witchlighter said with a smirk, before turning around when she could no longer hear the sound of pages flipping. "Honey, did you find it?" She asked, moving back to the altar and looking down at the page.

"I think so." He replied, "It looks like we're dealing with a Water Wraith." He said, turning the top of the altar around so the rest of the group could see the illustration of the creature. It looked a lot like a Banshee, with the same pose that made the three sisters wonder if the two demons had been documented by the same witch. The only differences were that the women was soaking wet, and she looked a little more human. "An aquatic demon that lures people to their death by taking on the form of their previous victim, drawing in their prey and dragging them to the bottom of their watery dwelling, from where very few return…" He recited the first sentence before reading silently, "Oh, that's good. It's a Power of Three vanquish. Easy."

"Not so fast." Paige said, looking down at the entry and groaning, "Water Wraiths are skeletal beings, so unless we can cast the spell from far, far away, we're going to be sleeping with the fishes as soon as we vanquish her." She looked up, shaking her head in process, "We should try and find another way, because getting vaporized is not what I had in mind for a late April afternoon." She said sarcastically.

"Maybe we could use my power?" Brennan suggested, standing up from the sofa, "I mean, if I can get close enough and the area of water is small enough to contain the voltage into a set space, she'll be toast the moment I spark up." He said, smiling and rubbing his fingers together, sending a small jolt of static electricity through his body.

Piper shrugged, "Well, we could maybe use that idea to contain it, but it doesn't matter how we vanquish it, we're going to get the same lethal explosion. You'd be toast the moment you fried her. Not to mention you're probably not the best person to be using his powers around a lake, seeing as how you'll kill yourself if you get splashed mid demon flambé." She turned around to Paige, "Maybe you could orb us out after we said the spell?"

"I don't think that would work." Phoebe countered, "I think our presence is required for the spell to keep working. We can't just orb out or the spell would just fizzle out and leave us with the demon." She explained, folding her arms and resting them on her enlarged stomach. "I would say we cast a spell on ourselves so we could breathe underwater and contain the explosion in the lake, but I'm not exactly the strongest swimmer in my current state…"

Aidan frowned, obviously thinking over what Phoebe had just said, before grinning, "No, but you may be onto something with containing the explosion in the water…"

* * *

Paige bit her lip as she surveyed her husband from behind. In preparation for the plan, Aidan had changed into a pair of navy blue swimming shorts and was currently stretching and limbering up. "I don't know why you don't swim more often…" She breathed, her eyes darkened with lust as she watched the muscles in the elemental's back flex with each movement.

Aidan looked around, grinning and shaking his head before continuing, "You know, neither do I. I used to go for a swim every morning when I was in college and little less regularly in my early twenties, but I guess it just fell to the side just like all the other stuff I used to like doing with my free time…" He said sadly, putting his left arm across his chest and pushing against his elbow with his right hand.

The witchlighter instantly lost her playful attitude and sat up properly on the boulder she was sitting on. "Well, you should definitely start up again if you enjoy it. I mean, me, the kids and your job shouldn't be the only things in your life. You'll go mad. I know I would." She said, watching as he gave his body one last shake, "It's like me and that giant canvas in the garage. I've been painting on it for the last two months, it's my creative outlet."

"I'll think about it." Aidan replied stonily, before walking towards Piper, Phoebe and Brennan, each of them standing around on the dock, as they had been waiting for him to finish prepping.

"Okay, let's go over the plan again." Piper said, standing up from the wooden stump she had been sitting on and putting her hands on her hips, "You'll go into the lake to try and lure the Water Wraith out of hiding, then Brennan traps her in an electrical field, we say our spell, and submerge her back into the water to contain the explosion." She looked around, seeing if there were any signs of disapproval. "Alright then, let's do it. Do you stuff, Aidan."

Taking a deep breath, the elemental walked to the edge of the dock, his toes hanging over the side before he –in an extremely professional manner- dove into the lake, cutting through the water seamlessly and barely even disturbing it as he broke the surface, not even leaving a trace of his descent into the water.

Paige shoved her hands into her jean pockets, almost enjoying the silence that was passing through the four of them. It wasn't an uncomfortable silence, it was just… quiet. She walked across to Piper, "So… This is where _it_ happened, huh?" She murmured quietly, looking out onto the water's clam surface, avoiding her oldest sister's eyesight as they both swayed on the dock.

"Yup…" Piper replied, pursing her lips and alternating between balancing on the heels and balls of her feet, also putting her hands in her pockets and mimicking Paige's stance without even realizing it. "I never thought I would have to be here again…" She said.

The youngest Charmed One looked down through the cracks in the wood that made up the dock, looking at the dark water sloshing around underneath, "It's weird. I feel like I've been here before, standing here in this very spot, but I don't ever remember being here. Hell, the only reason I know about it is through the reputation you and Phoebe have built up over the last nine and a half years. Speaking of witch…" Paige frowned as she turned around and looked towards the witch in question, who was currently kneeling down at the water's edge, dipping her hand in, "What the hell is she doing?"

"Phoebe!" Brennan knelt down, putting his arms around his wife's shoulders and bringing her away from the water's edge, afraid that she could fall in, "Are you crazy? This lake is evil; the last thing you should be doing is getting too close. The Water Wraith could come after you." He warned, helping her to stand up with her enlarged belly.

"There are two beings in there…" Phoebe whispered, moving closer to her husband as he kept a firm grip on her upper arms, "Three if you count Aidan." She clarified, still in some sort of trance from the telempathic vibe she got from the lake. "Now that I'm here, it's a lot easier to tell between the two. The Water Wraith is the cold and ruthless one, obviously… But there's something else in there that feels so familiar and…" She narrowed her eyes, not really believing what she sensing, "It's loving…"

"Um, guys?" Paige said uncertainly, looking at the water's surface and taking a few steps back, "I think we're about to have some company." She said, drawing her sisters' attention to the streak underwater that was cutting through it easily.

Aidan suddenly burst out of the lake, landing expertly onto the dock and running off of it. As he did the wood that made up the jetty suddenly to burst up and shattered from the water pressure it was being pummeled with from beneath. The elemental made a leap for dry land just as the last of the dock was decimated in a loud crash, sending the brittle wood flying everywhere. "Incoming!" Aidan bellowed, getting to his feet and running towards the group.

The dust began to settle. A silhouette could be seen within its midst. The Water Wraith was clearly dripping wet, probably because this was the first time it had ever left its natural habitat. The three sisters stood together, Phoebe retrieving the Power of Three spell from her pocket in preparation for the vanquish while Brennan ignited vicious streams of voltage from his fingers. Once the demon was visible, the mutant stepped forward, ready to blast it with all his energy, before Phoebe forced his arm down, disarming him.

"_Mrs. Johnson?_" Piper and Phoebe shrieked in utter disbelieve. Where was no mistaking it, apart from the sickly green colour of her skin, and the decomposition of her body, this was Mrs. Johnson, the same woman that had looked after Prue and Piper at camp. Her auburn hair stuck to the sides of her rotting face, while her glazed over eyes narrowed at the three witches standing in front of her.

"You _know_ her?" Paige spluttered, before noticing out of the corner of her eye that the Water Wraith was moving towards them. She turned her head towards the enemy and watched her fly into the air, hurtling downwards and landing hard on the banking that surrounded the lake. The witchlighter smiled in triumph. She loved being able to move things with just a thought.

Her older sisters, however, were not so competent when dealing with this demon. The spell dropped from Phoebe's hand as she watched the Water Wraith levitate back into a standing position with a sickly grin, showing off severely decayed teeth. The two oldest Charmed Ones were suddenly jolted back out of their trances as a tesla coil streaked past their heads, courtesy of Brennan, and struck the demon in the chest, causing it to let out an unholy howl of pain. It seemed Water Wraiths had more in common with Banshees than just looks.

"Say your damn spell!" Brennan bellowed, letting out a curse as the lightning bolt dissipated, leaving only a few sparks spurting from his fingers.

Before any of them could retrieve the spell from the ground, the Water Wraith opened its mouth again, and instead of an ungodly screech coming out, a large amount of thick mist began to pour out extremely quickly. Within a few seconds, the fog had enveloped the group, leaving them blind to what the demon was planning next.

Piper suddenly felt Paige's hand being ripped from her own, "Paige!" She shouted into the mist, before she heard a loud splash and felt tiny droplets of water hit her skin, "Paige!" She bellowed again as the fog began to vanish just as quickly as it had came. All the eldest Charmed One could see were bubbles on the water's surface. Her sister had been taken.

* * *

"I can't believe we have to vanquish Mrs. J…" Phoebe said sadly as she stood in front of the Book of Shadows, making small adjustments to the Power of Three spell she had prepared to vanquish the Water Wraith. The middle Charmed One cringed as she replayed a memory in her head, "Did you see how bad she looked though? Blech…"

"Well, spending ten years at the bottom of a lake as a corpse will do that to a girl's complexion." Piper quipped back as she swung the amethyst over a camping guide to the rural area of Camp Skylark and the surrounding wood. "What confuses me is how she's even still around. Does the book say anything about dead mortals becoming Water Wraiths?" She asked, knowing that her sister had the tome open at the page.

Phoebe looked down at the page, before shaking her head. "Nope. They're just demons. It doesn't say anything about them coming into being from anything. Although I think it was probably the residual evil in the lake that did this to her…"

"What do you mean?"

"Oh, come on. The demon that killed Mom was in that lake for around thirty years… Even though it's gone, it's bound to have left some sort of spiritual wound on the area; it's probably what turned Mrs. J in the first place. When this is over, we should purify the land." Phoebe replied, going back to tweaking the spell.

Piper shook her head in disgust, "I can't believe this is still haunting us… Do you think that the second being you sensed is maybe the Water Demon? Maybe we didn't vanquish it and it's still in there." She said in a quick tone, showing her panic. "I don't think I can go up against that thing again, Phoebe."

"You don't have to." She said immediately, wanting to keep her sister calm, "The being I felt was benevolent, although I still don't know what it is." Phoebe looked up, "I'm more worried about Brennan and whether or not he's going to manage to look after all the kids. Maybe if Aidan hadn't just dived into the water, he could have helped… Do you think she's still alive?" Phoebe asked uncertainly.

Piper kept her eyes down on the map in front of her, letting a tense silence lie between them. "I don't know, but we're more useful doing this than just standing at the side of the lake, waiting for Aidan to come up for air, which, with his powers, would probably be half an hour." The eldest Charmed One's heart skipped a beat when the crystal landed on the map. "Huh… That's weird. It says she's in the mountain next to the lake."

"Maybe there's some sort of underwater tunnel that leads up to a cave in the mountain?" Phoebe suggested, shrugging her shoulders. "Either way, it's a good sign. She's alive. And who knows? If there is a tunnel, maybe Aidan found it and…" She trailed off, shaking her head, "… is getting his ass kicked by the Water Wraith… Maybe we should get Annabelle in on this. Where is she anyway?"

"No idea. She zipped out of here early this morning on a job or something. We need to reverse the spell to call a lost witch. It'll hopefully take us to her." Piper said, walking over to the Book of Shadows and beginning to flip through its pages, looking for the original spell.

* * *

Aidan was thrown across the cavern by a powerful jet of pressurized water that flew out from the pool that led back into the lake. It was being controlled by the Water Wraith, who stood in front of his wife's soaking, unconscious form. The demon's eyes lit up again with a ghostly green as the water once again rose from its rightful place with a loud sloshing noise, heading straight for Aidan with enough power to blast him through the rock wall.

The torrent of water suddenly froze in mid-sting, suspended in motion just before it hit the elemental. Piper and Phoebe stood behind the Water Wraith; the eldest of the two witches had her hands outstretched, showing that she had been the one responsible for the water's sudden halt. "Something tells me you're not in a mood for roasting marshmallows, so…" Piper made another gesture, this time towards the Water Wraith and causing the demon to be thrown back a few feet by a fiery explosion that had struck her in the chest.

"Paige… Paige, wake up…" Phoebe gently cooed to her knocked out sister, shaking her gently in an attempt to wake her up. She kept this up for a few seconds, before almost slapping herself for own stupidity as she realized she had a far easier and quicker way to do this. Quickly concentrating, a white globe of mental energy appeared in front of Phoebe's forehead before it shot into Paige's mind, stimulating it and causing her to wake up with a groan.

Aidan got up from where he had been thrown to and watched as the jet of water that had been heading for him unfroze, and fell harmlessly to the floor with a loud splash. Piper and Phoebe tended to their baby sister, all the while unaware that the Water Wraith was recovering from its fall, its eyes glowing once again as a new coil of water rose from the pool, before heading towards the Charmed Ones, "Piper! Look out!" Aidan bellowed.

The eldest witch turned around just in time to see the typhoon heading towards her and her sisters. "Get behind me!" She screamed, holding her arms out in a protective stance and taking in a deep breath. Phoebe and Paige crouched behind her as deep orange cracks began to cover her body as she massed out, preparing to take the very brunt of the aquatic assault.

Piper scrunched up her eyes in fear at what was coming. The water hit her. Hard. And even in her massed out state, caused her to slide back a little. It was like being hit with one hundred of the fire department's finest high pressure hoses. She bared her teeth in agony as she struggled to hold her breath, knowing that if she was to take a breath, both her and her siblings would be done for.

"Paige! You have to orb us away!" Phoebe screamed over the loudness of the water that was pummeling her big sister.

"Don't you think I would have done that the moment this started if I could?" Paige shouted back, "Something about this cave is not letting me orb! We can't do anything!"

Phoebe was about to respond again, before a bright blue glow shone against her sister's wet, pale face. She looked up to see where the light was coming from, and her jaw hit the floor as she did.

A large sphere of eerie blue light was hovering above the pool. Streaks of energy gently flew out from it, lapping against the cave walls before going back to the source. The ball expanded a little as the light grew harsher and more ripples of calming energy flew out from it. The Water Wraith's concentration was broken by this, causing the formidable torrent of water to lose its momentum and fall to the ground in a large splash. Piper finally took a breath, barely managing to stand as she recovered from the attack she had just braved. It was a great labour to raise her hands in the direction of the energy, preparing to blast it out of the air.

"Piper, don't!" Paige shouted her eyes lighting up with a golden glow as she looked towards the sphere of energy with her power of multi-dimensional sight. "Don't blast it!" She urged, almost smiling with joy. "I can see her now…"

"Who? What are you talking about?" Phoebe asked, looking towards the energy before sensing that this was the second being that she had sensed in the lake, but at such close proximity, she could now see it's identity, "Oh my God…" The blue energy it seemed, was just a disguise for the being's true form, as it began to subside at a rather quick rate, and in a white flash, revealing who the second being had been all along.

Patricia Halliwell floated above the pool, her eyes closed in serene concentration as the energy around her continued to fade away, making her dark brown locks fly around her face in a vicious manner before settling gently onto her shoulders. The mother of the Charmed Ones opened her eyes, looking down at the Water Wraith with fierce determination before bursting into thousands of tiny streams of blue light that flew towards the demon, enveloping it in a cocoon of bright blue light that spun around the evil being's form.

"_Say your spell, my daughters…"_

The three Charmed Ones were paralyzed by the momentary shock of seeing their mother here, before Piper snapped out of it and joined her sisters on the ground as Phoebe proceeded to yank the spell from her pocket. They each looked up as they chanted, tears in their eyes as they realized that their mother was sacrificing herself to protect them, "She who lies in the deepest ocean, she who kills with one quick motion, we call upon our Wiccan might, destroy her now, remove this plight!"

There was a loud screech of pain as the spell began to take effect. The blue light that was spinning around the dying demon began to turn faster as the skeletal energy was released. A deafening explosion that would have incinerated everyone in cave was contained by the energy that constricted the demon before both blew in a shower of aquamarine sparks, leaving the cave walls to shake from the sheer power that had passed through it.

"It's over now…" Phoebe breathed, her voice shaky as she watched the blue-green sparks descend to the ground, "Both of them are gone…"

* * *

Pamela opened the door to the roof of her building, smiling immediately as the evening sun reflected off every glass surface in Manhattan, bathing the city in an orange glow that was completely appropriate for the time of year. She walked out onto the flat cement floor, striding over the roof and to the edge, taking in a deep breath and looking out onto her home. She felt a sudden gust of wind that felt both odd and out of place. "So, is this place our spot now?" She said drolly to the person she knew was standing behind her.

"Don't we have to be together to have a spot?" Keith asked as he came up behind her, standing so close to her that Pamela could feel his breath on the back of her neck and smell the strong mint fragrance of the breath mint the mutant must have had before coming here.

"I don't know what we are." She admitted, turning around and silently willing him to take a few steps back, as she extremely sensitive about her personal space being invaded, "We've done everything in the wrong order, haven't we?" She asked rhetorically, before continuing, "The whole witch thing, then the sympathy sex thing…"

"It wasn't out of sympathy." He said immediately, putting his hand to her arm before pulling away at the small flinch she made, "I wanted to be with you, as corny as that sounds… And now you're cringing at my very touch, for someone who hates to play games, you're certainly quite the expert at them." He said, turning and walking away a little.

Pamela sighed, running a hand through her hair and folding her arms, taking a classic defense position. "Okay, here's the deal. Me? Not good with emotions. I'm the sort of person who will push everything to the back of the closet instead of throwing it out… so to speak." She explained, "And the fact that you always seem to see me at my weakest and sorta… catch me when I fall… Well, it scares me. I don't do well in these situations. All the lovey dovey bull just flies right over my head, so-,"

She was cut off when Keith suddenly crashed his lips against her own, kissing her deeply and grasping her by her arms as he continued the lip lock for a good few seconds before pulling away, leaving Pamela stunned, "Had to shut you up somehow… you were ranting…" He grinned.

The Halliwell witch rolled her eyes, her normal demeanour returning as all the tension drained from the situation, "So, how about it? Will we give this a try and see where it takes us?" She droned, smirking slightly.

Keith shrugged casually, still not taking his hands off her arms, "Sure. Why not? My Thai Bride doesn't arrive for six to eight weeks anyway. I got to fill the gap somehow!" He joked, before leaning in and kissing her again.

* * *

Piper yanked at the large iron handle, pulling back the sliding wooden door and revealing the squalor that resided within the cabin. She took a step into the small house, turning to her two sisters and smiling, "I give you 'Casa Del Wilder'!" She said triumphantly, folding her arms and waiting for Paige's reaction, which, at the moment, was confusion.

"I don't get it… I thought we were just coming up here to purify the lake, what _is_ this place?" She asked with a grimace, clearly not impressed by how messy the place was. "My God… This is where good taste goes to die." She took a step in, cautiously lifting up some of the newspapers before letting them drop. "Would you guys please explain what we're doing here?"

Phoebe stepped up into the cabin, aided by Piper before she folded her arms over her stomach. "Your Dad lived here for around twenty years… He spent all that time trying to find a way to vanquish the demon that killed Mom, so we…" She shared a look with Piper, "… thought that you should maybe have a look around."

"But all that's here is old news clippings of drownings…" She sneered at one of the random newspapers she picked up, putting it back down and looking around the room before noticing a yellowed piece of paper on top of one of the newspapers. The witchlighter made a grab at it, and her expression immediately softened as she read the certificate. "He was teacher of the year in 1872?" She asked in disbelieve.

"And teachers were way better back then, so he must have been excellent!" Phoebe perked, before receiving a small tap on the shoulder from Piper, silently hinting that they should leave. "Um… we'll just leave you to have a look around and stuff." She said.

"Uh huh…" Paige said absentmindedly, not really listening as she lowered herself into a withered chair and looking at the certificate with more interest. After she was done, she reached for more things that had been from the same pile, hoping that they would more information, and not even realizing that Piper and Phoebe had left, leaving her to discover more about who she really was.

* * *


	13. Better The DeLauro You Know

**Better The DeLauro You Know**

Emma's eyes narrowed as she walked down the immaculate corridor of San Francisco Memorial. Her heels clicked against the sterile floor, making her look down and admire her reflection in the clean surface. The redhead's extremely long crimson locks were swept back away from her face, pulling into a tight ponytail that's only purpose was to keep her hair away from her eyes, while tight leather pants and a close fitted tank top clung to her body, making them perfect for tough maneuvers and anything but a hindrance. Her blue eyes had turned to ice with the determination that shone in them, giving her a cold demeanour which only added to her foreboding aura.

She reached the nurse's station, turning right and left and looking down the corridors for something she knew was there, she could sense it. Emma suddenly felt a small pulse of magical energy ripple through the corridor, which was followed an even bigger pulse. Her eyes widened in realization at what was happening, and she promptly vanished in a swirl of rose pink orbs that flew up through the ceiling.

Only a second passed before what could only be a described a giant fist crashed through the wall with a deafening rumble. Large pieces of hardened cement and mortar flew everywhere, decimating the empty nurse's station and smashing all the glass windows that kept it separate from the rest of the corridor. The leathery blue fist pulled out of the corridor, leaving a gaping a gaping hole in the wall that led outside.

Emma reappeared in the same column of pink orbs she had disappeared in, watching the trail of back smoke that seemed to follow the colossal fist as it left the building. She looked outwards, her mouth dropping open when all she could see was a massive cloud of black smoke, writhing and swirling to a height almost as tall as the hospital. The redhead's eyes narrowed to the point where it looked as if they were closed as she scanned the demon, going through all her knowledge before figuring out what this creature was. Emma let a smirk fall across her face when she realized what it was. Katrina had really gone all out on this one.

She leapt out of the hole in the wall, falling fast towards the ground and plummeting to what would have been her death if she hadn't pulled out of her kamikaze dive by slowing her fall, hovering a few inches above the ground before landing delicately on the cement tiles that covered the entrance of the hospital. Emma held out her arms and opened her hands as two bright white lights danced in her palms. Each one extended outwards from both sides, before becoming her weapons. Two double edged swords were held tightly in Emma's hands, each one nearly as tall their bearer.

The being moved within the black smoke, a column of the dark gas coming down and heading straight for Emma before she flew to the side with supernatural speed, hearing the eardrum-shattering crash as the creature's foot connected with the ground. The body part in question had become momentarily visible, showing Emma that is was the same leathery dark blue that the fist had been, before the black smoke caught up with it and concealed the entire being once again.

"Why does it bother with that smoke? It's not as if makes it any harder to spot." Emma mused to herself, before the cold light from the gray sun in the sky suddenly vanished from her face as the creature tried to crush her with its foot again. This time, she took a far more offensive tactic, thrusting her swords up into the air and cringing when she felt them sink into the sole of the creature's foot.

An ungodly howl of pain erupted from the top of the black smoke as it recoiled immediately, beginning to stumble and sending a tremor through the earth with each uneasy step. Emma dropped her swords and held her right hand towards the stumbling mass of darkness. An unfathomable amount of energy grew and crackled in her palm before flying off and hitting the creature within the black smoke. The sphere of power vanished as it went into the darkness. There was a small silence before the pulse detonated against the being's true form, causing a small portion of the black smoke to explode outwards and reveal part of its thick blue torso in the process. The redhead continued this pattern, being relentless as she fired energy pulse after energy pulse from her hand, before the creature let out one last roar as it toppled to the ground, making the earth itself move and shake as it crushed part of the hospital's east wing with its unbelievable weight, causing another ear-splitting crash to race out from the accident point and blast Emma's hair backwards from the sheer force as the building was crushed.

All she could see in front of her was a thick cloud of dust from the wreckage, before it began to clear, revealing to Emma was in front of her. Her eyes were met with the sole of a massive blue foot; that had two puncture wounds from Emma's swords, gallons of crimson blood pouring from its injury. Losing that amount of blood would be instantly fatal to a human, but to these beings, it was as harmless as being prodded with a needle. The black smoke had cleared with the creature's defeat, exposing what could only be described as a giant gremlin. Its massive form was splayed out across the building wreckage, its eyes dull as it had slipped into unconsciousness while its thick skinned chest rose and fell gently, being the only sign of the creature still being alive.

"Good work." Emma turned around to see that it had been Katrina to speak. She was holding a large black crystal orb in her hands as she smirked at the psionic, "Not many people can say they took down a Golem, even for agents of the Higher Power like us, it's quite the feat." She said, before looking down and sneering at the orb in her hand, "Of course, it was my first time piloting a Golem, so may have not fared as well if a more experienced tamer had been at the helm of the Eye." She explained, referring to the orb in her hands.

"I don't see how they're so hard to defeat." Emma side with a hint of contempt, holding out both her hands and summoning back the swords she had dropped, "Their movements are slow, they're hardly stealthy, and the black smoke ruse only makes it easier to spot." She said, clenching her fists and making her weapons vanish in a flash of light.

"The greatest fear in this universe is the fear of the unknown," Katrina explained, looking into the orb and seeing a depth that wasn't apparent to Emma, "Wreathing itself in black smoke plays on that fear." She looked up with a questioning glance, "Be truthful, and not just because I'll know you're lying…" She ordered, waiting until the psionic nodded, "…If you hadn't been educated on a Golem, would you have been scared when its fist came crashing through that wall?"

Emma looked down, not wanting to admit that perhaps she had a point, "I guess…" She said meekly, before looking up with fierce determination, "But I would have dealt with it with all the knowledge that I possessed, like a true Higher Being." She said proudly, before looking towards the downed Golem and licking her lips in preparation for what she was about to say, "… And I think that this proves I'm ready."

Katrina gave her a puzzled look, before realizing what she talking about, "Emma… We've talked about this at length. You're not ready to return to the Mortal Realm. Your training still isn't complete. I hoped that facing a Golem would teach you this…" She said sadly, clearly disappointed that Emma seemed to have learned nothing.

"If anything, this enforces the fact that I'm ready! Golems are rare and powerful creatures that even Higher Beings can't properly kill all the time. I've proved myself. If you think I'm going to be in danger from a demonic threat, then you really haven't been watching my powers grow over the past months." Emma spat, gesturing towards the gigantic creature.

"Golems are the perfect example. See, while Golems aren't the strongest creatures in the world, they are certainly the most resilient." Katrina stared deeply into the black orb in her hands, and immediately the massive being began to wake up, "No matter how many times you knock it down, all it takes is an order from its master to get back up and continue fighting." The Golem had now stood up to its full monstrous height, as black smoke began to envelop it. It was certainly renewed, "While you believe your powers to be absolute, they have their limitations. If you were to continue fighting the Golem, it would win out of endurance and kill you." She explained darkly, before both the Golem and the training area vanished, leaving the two of them standing amidst a sky of stars, just like when the Halliwells had stood here a year and a half ago.

"Yeah, but I'm hardly going to be running into any Golems in the real San Francisco." Emma replied skeptically, "Please…" She pleaded, "I need to see the sisters. They're the closet thing to family I have, and I need to see my daughter more than anything!" She exclaimed, before sighing and looking at her feet, "Just give me one chance. I promise things will work out."

Katrina surveyed the redhead across from her for a few seconds, before un-pursing her lips and gulping, "Go." She said quietly and simply, "Just don't say I didn't warn you…" She growled.

The psionic's face instantly lit up. She had to fight the urge to hug Katrina as she knew she wouldn't appreciate the gesture. "Thank you!" She breathed, before vanishing in a column of rosy pink orbs that descended down the starry sky, heading for the Mortal Realm.

"It's not the right time…" Katrina said sadly to herself, shaking her head at the pink orbs that were disappearing from view, "One way or another, you're going to learn that…"

* * *

"I _cannot_ believe you dragged me here when I have so much to do at the restaurant. Opening night is six weeks away and I have not made the progress I wish I had, not to mention I have to juggle that with trying to find my husband, being a mother, being a Charmed One…" Piper hissed at the back of Annabelle's head. "I mean, who the hell hunts demons in the Underworld at seven thirty in the morning?"

Annabelle rolled her eyes in frustration, "Couldn't you have voiced this rant before we actually came down here?" She asked in an equally hushed voice as she peered around the edge of the bumpy cave wall. "First of all, _I_ hunt demons at seven thirty in the morning. I do it for a frickin' living. And second of all, this _will_ help you get Leo back. I did some research, and found out that there's an Oracle in these parts. She's supposed to be pretty powerful."

Piper groaned at the thought of dealing with this particular kind of demon, "Ugh… Oracles. All of them are such whores. Can't we find a Seer or a Soothsayer?" She asked with a sneer before letting an impatient sigh and striding into the chamber, letting out a curse when it was completely empty. "Okay, why did you have me hiding behind that column all that time when you could see it was empty?" She asked with wide eyes.

"Maybe because it's not empty." Annabelle replied, pulling a potion out of her pocket and flinging it over Piper's shoulder. The vial shattered on the ground, a cloud of pure white smoke flying up from the remains of glass and vanishing as it hit the ceiling. There was a white glow around the place the smoke had covered, before a blonde Oracle in an extremely glistening and revealing outfit was exposed standing in its place, a look of fear plastered on her face.

The demon tried to shimmer away, only to be frozen mid-escape by Piper, giving the Oracle a rather comical look, as her body looked as if it had been stretched out to the sides. Making a turning gesture with her hand, Piper unfroze the demon's head, laughing a little at the groan the Oracle emitted when she realized she was trapped in the middle of her transportation. "What kind of sorcery is this?" She spat, looking down at her wavering body.

"Witchcraft." Piper explained, clasping her hands calmly in front of her. "Here's the deal. You tell me what I want to know, and I don't blow up your body piece by piece. Especially since I'm really pissy in the morning and I don't like to see bloody stumps before my first coffee of the day." She warned, raising her hands in an offensive gesture, "What do you know about what happened to my husband?"

"I don't know what you're talking about… I swear." The Oracle growled back in response, actual fear showing in her eyes as she knew she didn't have the answer the witch was looking for.

"What are you swearing to, honey?" Piper said darkly, walking over to the demon in question until she was almost standing on her frozen feet. "God isn't exactly on your side. Mind you, it seems he hasn't been on mine either recently, so…" She made a quick flicking gesture, reducing the Oracle's left hand into dust and leaving a bleeding stump. The demon let out a high-pitched screech of pain, making Piper cringe from the intensity of the scream.

"She doesn't know anything." A voice said confidently from the shadows before Emma revealed herself, striding out into the dimly let chamber and smirking at the Oracle. "They may be able to see into the future, but I don't think Oracles have the brains to use information for leverage." She glared at the demon, her pupils dilating to the point her irises turned black. The Oracle blew up in a fierce nova, sending a shower of shining purple sparks across the floor. She had been vanquished with just a look.

Piper's face had completely drained of her colour. Her hands, still up from their blasting position, fell limp as her wrists could no longer hold them up. She began backing away, mumbling to herself as she grasped wildly, trying to find Annabelle for any form of support. "What the hell…?" She breathed, looking at the redhead with utter disbelief.

Emma shrugged, "I'm back."

* * *

"Hey! Hey! What do you think you're doing?" Brennan exclaimed as he walked into the future bedroom of the little girl that was yet to be born, putting Connor down on the floor. Old curtains and bed sheets had been spread across the floor, while a warm spring breeze blew in through the window that had been fully opened. Phoebe stood at the wall to the right, haphazardly slapping white paint onto the wall with the thick paintbrush.

The middle Charmed One grinned at her husband and son, a small dot of white paint on the tip of her nose, while her stomach bulge stood out in her deep blue top against the white wall. "What does look like I'm doing? I'm painting." She said, shaking her head as she dipped her brush into the paint can that sat atop one of the steps on the ladder. "Hey, can you pass me that roller? I think I missed a little bit of the ceiling."

Brennan looked to the side, seeing that there was an extendable roller brush propped up on the wall next to the door. "Uh… No, I'm not passing you anything. I thought the whole point of me being here was so that you wouldn't have to do these things? Why don't you go and read or something? Let me do this." He offered, picking up the roller brush and frowning at it.

"Because I've already started on it and I would like to finish. Connor! Don't put your hands on the…" She trailed off, letting out a sigh when her son pulled his hands back from the painted wall, revealing his white palms and leaving two grubby handprints on the once spotless white wall.

"Cool!" Connor grinned, showing off a set of pearly white teeth before pressing his hands against his cheeks, making Phoebe elicit a yelp of frustration as he pulled them away, showing her the two white handprints now on his face. "Daddy, you try it! It smells really funny."

At this comment, Brennan shot an accusatory look at his wife, "Oh, what? Don't give me that look!" Phoebe protested. "I cracked a window. I'm not that stupid!" She exclaimed, gesturing towards the open window before letting out a sigh. "Okay, alright, I relent. You do this. I'll go get him cleaned up and put some breakfast together…" A high-pitched ringing could be heard from downstairs, "… And apparently, I'm going to answer to the phone too." She said, taking Connor gently by the wrist and leading him downstairs, "C'mon, little man. Let's get your face clean before Aunty Paige comes over to do the mural for your little sister's room!"

Brennan covered his mouth as he yawned. Phoebe had been having trouble sleeping, in turn disturbing the mutant's own sleeping patterns. Both of them had been up at seven, on a Saturday morning no less. It was only seven forty-five right now, and so far Brennan had been to the twenty four hour grocery store, taken Connor to the park, and was now finishing off a paint job that his wife had been working on since she had got up. He rubbed his face, trying to make the fatigue go away, before letting out a sigh and picking up the roller, beginning on a blank spot.

"Um… We have to go over to Piper's." Phoebe croaked as she appeared at the doorway with a now cleaned up Connor. The middle Charmed One's face was a mixture of confusion and shock. Whatever she had been told on the phone had shaken her to her core.

"What is it?" Brennan asked, putting the roller back against the wall.

Phoebe looked up, not knowing how to respond before deciding on the easiest explanation, "Emma."

* * *

Aidan held the pinch of powdered dragon scale above the potion pot warily. For the forth time, he looked down at the complicated notes that had been scribbled onto the paper in Paige's handwriting. Even with his glasses on, the elemental found his wife's diagrams impossible to understand, and trying to decipher her handwriting was a lost cause. Taking a leap of faith, he took his thumb and index finger apart, letting the turquoise dust fall into the pot, immediately causing a rather powerful shockwave to erupt from the cauldron with a large cloud of smoke, throwing Aidan to the floor and causing the twins, who had been sitting at the kitchen table all this time, to burst into a fit of giggles.

"Oh yeah, very funny. Dad fell on his butt." Aidan said in a monotonous tone as he got himself up off the floor, sending a playful glare at his two daughters as they ate their cereal at the table. "Just you two wait, in about twenty years time, you're going to be doing this, and then you're going to be falling on your butts!" He said, grinning mischievously that showed where his children got it from.

"Phew! I certainly hope I'm not smelling breakfast." Paige exclaimed, crinkling her nose in disgust at the pungent stench coming from the potion. "Oh… honey, you're not trying to make that potion, are you? My little symbols are pretty hard to follow if you're not me." She smirked, looking into the pot and grimacing. "Look, just let me have a few days to have a look over my notes, and the ones Emma left. I can't believe she was working on a cure for Melinda's magical illness. She got pretty far before she… you know." She trailed off, looking over to her two daughters as they ate their breakfast, "So anyway, I know it's just one ingredient I'm missing, so don't go wasting everything we have, please?" The witchlighter asked with her biggest grin.

Aidan sighed, looking into the bubbling cauldron in defeat. "Okay, I'll pour this down the sink. All this witchcraft stuff must not come naturally to non-witches. Although I don't see why not, seeing as how potion making is just bunging stuff into a pot." He said, turning off the gas and picking up the pot, carrying it to the sink and pouring its remains down the drain. "So what do you want to do today?"

Paige shrugged, stifling a yawn as she though over the question. "Well, maybe we could go up the lake or something? It's a nice day, not to mention you're going to have to teach the kids how to swim sooner or later." She smiled, "And we purified the ground, so no demons will be interrupting."

"Did you guys ever figure out why your Mom's spirit was there? I mean, she hasn't been holding on all this time, has she? You've summoned her before." Aidan asked as he put the empty pot into the sink, turning around and folding his arms, "Not to mention why Piper's spell to find Leo led her to the lake in the first place."

"Phoebe thought it was something to do with a fragment of Mom's spirit laying dormant in the lake until it was awakened when we were in danger." She explained, "And it turned out that Piper's spell wasn't specifically for Leo. It was for a lost family member, and since a part of my Mom's soul was technically lost…" She looked down at her lap for a moment, before the phone that hung from the kitchen wall began to ring.

Aidan grabbed it from its console. "Hello? Oh, hey, Piper." There was silence as he listened to the person on the other end of the line. "Um… yeah, she's here. Are you alright?" He listened again, "Okay." He held in front of Paige, "Your sister."

Frowning, the witchlighter took the phone and held it. "Hey. What's up?" She asked as Piper began to explain. Aidan watched in fascination as his wife's face gradually drained of its colour. "We'll be right there." She said strongly, pressing a button on the phone and hanging up. "Get dressed." She ordered, seeing that Aidan was still dressed in his sleeping attire. "I'll get the girls ready. We need to go."

* * *

Emma stood in front of the Halliwells in their entirety. She decided that Pam, all three Charmed Ones, and their families were probably more frightening than any jury that she had ever seen. The only noise in the attic was when the kids would whisper things to one another, and when Annabelle turned a page in the Book of Shadows. "Would someone please say something before I turn to stone and shatter from all your looks? I know you have questions. I can sense it."

"Pheebs, what can you sense from her?" Piper asked in an edgy tone, trying not to give away any of her emotion when she spoke. Lorna was being held in her arms, and was about three seconds away from being held in a vice grip, as Piper's hold on her tightened with every passing minute.

"Nothing." Phoebe replied stonily, holding Connor on her lap in the same type of hold in fear for his safety. "Which means one of three things, something is blocking me, she herself is blocking me, or she has no thoughts or emotions to read." She explained, locking eyes with her fellow psionic. "Or it could be all the above. The only I'm sensing from her is power beyond anything we've ever come across."

Pamela stood up from the arm of the chair she had been sitting on, "How do we even know you're Emma? You could be some super-powerful demon trying to gain our trust before killing us. Hell, you could be Diam for all we know!" She exclaimed, not noticing Piper shift uncomfortably at that name. "What proof do you have besides your appearance? Because if you are a demon, Emma's hair was never down to her waist!"

"This…" Emma began, grabbing onto her ponytail and bringing it her front, a flash of dark red hair suddenly becoming visible as she did, "… is what happens when you spend a year and a half asleep in a bubble. Hair maintenance doesn't really factor in that much." She stood in silence once again while everyone avoided eye contact, "You guys, please talk to me. I'm still the same Emma."

"Aidan, I think you should take the kids to Atlantis…" Paige said lowly, looking up to her husband as he gripped her shaking hand. "They'll be safe there until we can figure this out."

"Okay…" He replied, trying to bring up the atmosphere for the children, "Alright, you guys!" He said brightly, rubbing his hands together and grinning, "Let's all form a circle. I'm gonna go take you to see the big castle that I have. Maybe you guys can get some ice cream!"

The kids didn't fall for his false excitement, but complied nonetheless, getting off the couch and walking towards Aidan. All of them were standing together in a circle, before Chris suddenly broke away and ran at Emma, wrapping his arms around her waist and hugging her tightly, "I'm glad you're back, Emma!" He said brightly, looking up and grinning at the redhead, showing off the gaps where his baby teeth were falling out.

"Thanks, honey. I'm glad to be back!" She said with an equally cheerful tone, before noticing Piper's glare. "But you should probably go and join your brother and cousins…" She said with a whisper, ruffling his hair before he made his way to the circle.

Aidan was ready to leave, before noticing something, "Piper, isn't Lorna coming with?" He asked, seeing that the toddler wasn't part of the circle of children.

"No…" Piper replied, standing up and holding Lorna's hand as she too stood, "Lorna's staying here." This statement earned the eldest Charmed One surprised looks from her two sisters. "She'll be safe under our protection. Go."

Letting out a sigh, Aidan took a deep breath as he and all of the kids slowly dissolved into water, their bodies turning into liquid and staying standing for a second, before bursting and dispersing into the floor, vanishing without a trace.

Silence once again tilled the attic with tension, before Emma knelt down on her knees and looked Lorna in the eye, "Do you remember me, Lorna? All the talks we had in your head?" She asked sweetly, looking to the toddler to confirm her identity and put everyone's minds at rest.

Lorna gave her mother an uneasy look, before her eyes lit up and she grinned, "Mommy!" She beamed, wrenching her hand away from Piper's in a way that broke the eldest Charmed One's heart in two. She had already lost Leo, now she was losing her surrogate daughter to a dead person. "I's so glad you're back…" Lorna whispered as she hugged Emma, playing with her mother's hair and giggling, "It's like mine!"

"Yeah…" Emma replied, trying to hide the fact that she torn. Piper's sadness was overwhelming her, yet she was happy to be with her daughter. "But I think you should maybe go back to Piper. She knows what's best for you." She said, standing up and looking at the witch who was barely managed to survive inside.

"No, it's okay…" Piper said with a half smile, beginning to walk towards the psionic. "I guess Lorna proves it." She said, smiling through tears of joy and sadness before wrapping her arms around Emma's neck, "Oh my God! I can't believe it… I just don't…" She whispered. "You're back."

"Hopefully, for good." She said back, releasing Piper, only to be caught in a bear hug by Brennan that lifted her up off the floor. She cringed a little in pain, trying to endure this affectionate act from her old friend without letting on that he was hurting her.

Brennan finally let her go, her feet hitting off the floor as he placed his hands on her shoulders, "You know, this dying then coming back thing is starting to be a really nasty pattern. Try and keep this life, okay?" He joked.

"I'll try." Emma smiled, before noticing Pamela, Phoebe, and Paige, all sitting on the sofa in close contact. They were a mixture of anger, fear, and confusion, each of them staying silent and avoiding the psionic's gaze as they shifted uncomfortably on the couch, fidgeting with their hands.

"There's nothing here on the Higher Power you were talking about, apart from an extremely powerful demon that was banished by one your kind. Let's hope he's not going to be a problem." Annabelle said flatly, shutting the book over and staring at Emma, trying to hide the fact that she had really been in contact with the psionic for months.

The redhead rolled her eyes, instantly knowing to go along with what her ally was doing. "Of course there isn't." She spat, "It's supposed to remain a secret. And just because you know about it, it doesn't mean it'll be added to the book. The Higher Power is the exception; we did give you the book in the first place after all." She pointed out, before smiling and folding her arms, "And don't worry about the demon, if he attacks, he'll be a pile of bone dust within a matter of seconds!"

* * *

"You summoned me, Molron?" The lowly demon bowed before his master as he materialized out of the swirling black spheres that had brought him here in the first place. "Has it really happened? Has a Higher Being come out into the open?" He asked with curiosity and wide eyes, not being able to hide his excitement.

Molron waved his hand at the bubbling cauldron that he had used to cast the summoning ritual, causing it to vanish and fade away. "She appeared around an hour ago. She's something a little different, though. A lot more powerful than the one that masqueraded as a Seer to Satanos two years ago…" He mused, rubbing his hands together in thought before running one through his slick black hair. "I think this may be the one I've been waiting for…"

The henchman's eyes sparkled with excitement, "When will you be collecting her powers? Surely a demon of your caliber will be able to obtain her abilities." He said, shoving his hands into the pockets of his dirty coat and calmly awaiting his master's next order.

"She'll be difficult to take down, especially since she's stronger than the Higher Being that bound me to this mortal world in the first place. But she had a family and friends before becoming what she is today…" He smirked darkly, "They will come in handy." Molron turned to the lower demon, "Attack her with a platoon. She's in the company of the Charmed Ones, it won't be easy."

The demon's confidence and interest suddenly vanished from his face, "The Charmed Ones? You want us to go up against them _and_ a Higher Being? It's suicide! We'll be killed the moment we shimmer into their home." He argued, fidgeting with his hands as he brought them out of his pockets, "Wouldn't we be better to just wait until they had separated?"

"No. I need to gauge her at her full strength so I know what I'm up against." Molron replied, holding out his hand as a plume of navy blue flames erupted in his palm, bringing forth an icy blue fireball. "The witches will be no problem to me…" He turned to his servant, suddenly enraged, "Go! Attack the Manor with your men!" He bellowed, causing the demon to vanish immediately within a shimmer, "I shall have my revenge on the Higher Power…"

* * *

"So, what colour are you wanting next?" Emma asked her daughter as they sat at the kitchen table, looking down at a piece of paper that Lorna had been scribbling on with crayons for the past half hour. She had spent the entire day with her daughter while the Halliwells had argued and bickered over her return. She had never meant to cause this much trouble.

"Um… grey!" The little girl beamed, taking the crayon from her mother's fingertips and continuing with her drawing, her tongue poking out the side of her mouth in concentration as she scribbled hard onto the paper.

Emma smiled at her daughter's determined expression before her happiness was replaced with curiosity as she looked down at the picture Lorna was drawing. There was a stick person in the middle with a large circle for a mouth, supposed to show that the person was shouting or screaming. Their body was covered in scribbles of orange, red, and yellow crayon, supposedly meaning flames. Two grey mounds of scribbles were on either side of the flaming stick person. Emma frowned, "Lorna, what are you drawing?"

The toddler stayed silent, grabbing a brown crayon and giving the person in the middle long scribbled hair. Before she could question her daughter any further, Paige walked into the kitchen, avoiding the redhead's eyes as she crossed the room to the refrigerator, where she got a bottle of water and headed for the door again.

"A thistle."

Paige stopped her tracks, turning around and giving Emma a perplexed expression, "Excuse me?"

"A thistle." She repeated. "That's what's been missing from your potion to cure Melinda. I've sorta been watching. You've done really well to get so far just from my messy notes, although I've noticed you've made a few messy notes or your own." She smirked, looking down at her hands, "Paige, you're the person I want to settle things with the most. Please talk to me." She pleaded.

The witchlighter contemplated the proposition for a few seconds, nervously tapping the top of her water bottle with the palm of her hand, before sitting down at the kitchen table, "A thistle, huh?" She mused, before breaking out into a small smile, "Of course…" She smiled, knowing that she was going to concoct the potion the moment she was done here. "So, really have been watching us?"

"Whenever I'm not training, yes."

"Oh, I guess that explains the light bondage outfit. Do I even want to know what you were being trained to do?" Paige joked, letting out a small chuckle as the tension drained from her body. "Maybe if you had arrived in a less foreboding outfit this whole thing would have gone easier for everyone. Hey, I hear jeans are popular with us lowly humans."

Emma laughed a little, looking down at what she was wearing, "Yeah, it is a little full on, isn't it?" She asked rhetorically, clicking her fingers and changing her outfit within a flash of light, making Paige jump with surprise. "Better?" The redhead was now clad in low riding faded jeans, while a fluffy woolen turtle neck covered her torso.

"Definitely." Paige smirked.

"Mommy…" Lorna began, putting down her crayon and looking up at her mother, who smiled sweetly in return. "What's… light bondage?"

Both Emma and Paige's eyes widened in shock, "Well, sweetie…" The psionic began, trying to keep a straight face as her friend's sniggers at the end of the table caught her ears. "I'll tell you in fifteen years." She said flatly, before a crash from upstairs make her looking towards the ceiling, "Who's up there?"

Paige was already on her feet, heading for the doorway, "Everyone!"

* * *

Pamela was thrown across the room as a demon hit her hard across the face. She flew right into Piper and Annabelle, who both toppled to the ground as they were hit with Pamela's full weight, crashing into the table behind them and causing another loud crashing noise as more furniture. "Damnit!" The twenty year old seethed, wildly hurling her hand at the leader of five and throwing into his comrades with an explosive blast.

"Get… off!" Piper wheezed as she shoved her niece's body off her and Annabelle, "Ooh!" She yelped, throwing her hands out and the freezing the group of demons as they prepared to hurl a round of fireballs at the three women on the floor. "Brennan, zap them!" She ordered, her face hardening with determination as the demons began to break out of her freeze.

Making an assessment from the failed vanquish Pamela's blast had had, Brennan summoned all his power, neon blue sparks blasting from his fingertips before a large tesla coil tore from his hands, hitting one of the demons in the lower back and killing him in a gout of flames before he could properly unfreeze. "Phoebe, get out of here!" He bellowed, charging up another destructive blast as he did.

For once, Phoebe complied with an order to flee from a battle, waddling as fast as she could towards the attic door just as the demons unfroze. One of them, sighting the escaping witch, changed his aim and threw it towards her back.

"Fireball!" Paige shouted as she appeared in the doorway, causing the projectile to vanish in a cloud of twinkling orbs and reappear in the same fashion within her palm. She cringed slightly, never liking the feel of a fireball in her palm, before hurling it at the demon it had came from, hitting him squarely in the chest and vanquishing him with his own weapon.

"Thanks, Paige!" Phoebe squealed as she darted behind her baby sister and Emma, "I owe you one."

Annabelle, who was still recovering from being hit by Pamela, sat bolt up right, wheeling her arm back and throwing an energy ball towards the third demon, vanquishing him instantly with her slightly heightened demonic powers before leaping to her feet, "What do you want?" She spat, knowing that a well organized group of demons wouldn't just randomly attack.

"Her." The leader demon growled, pointing towards Emma, "Molron will come for the Higher Being, and there's nothing you can do about it!" He said with a grin, obviously having a lot of faith in his master.

"Molron?" Pamela repeated, remembering the name from the Book of Shadows.

"Tell Molron if he wants me, he can come and get me himself. Actually, don't. You want get the chance to…" Emma said darkly, before raising her hands and making a deep purple flash race through the room, creating an energy field that tore through the remaining duo of demons, reducing them to ash instantly, along with ripping apart the attic, sending objects flying into the air and smashing every window, leaving the Book of Shadows untouched.

"What the hell…" Piper began, standing up with a pale face and looking around wildly, "_… Did you do to my attic?_"

* * *

"Yup, this is the demon I found out about earlier." Annabelle confirmed as Pamela looked over her shoulder at the page. "Apparently, he was banished for eternity to the Underworld by a higher being, as he was too powerful for the forces of good to destroy him at that time." She explained.

"Okay, so if this guy was too powerful, why didn't the higher being just vanquish him? Surely they have the power to kill a pesky demon." Pamela argued, rubbing her cheek softly, still recovering from being thrown across the room. "Don't they? I mean, that was a fancy light show back there, Emma, but we could have vanquished those demons too. Why didn't your people kill this guy back then?"

"Because higher beings can't directly intervene with destiny, vanquishing such a powerful demon would have done that." She explained, "Let's face it, if higher beings vanquished demons regularly, there'd be none left for you guys, which I'm sure you'd miss terribly!" She smirked.

"Hah!" Piper boomed, "Unlikely." She growled, before looking at the page, "Okay, so the forces of good couldn't kill this guy back then, but then again, the forces of good didn't have the Charmed Ones. So, what do you say, Pheebs? Can you write a Power of Three spell for this guy?"

"Sure." Phoebe replied from the couch she was sitting on with Brennan, "Just pass the book my way and I'll get started." She asked politely, smiling at Pamela as she plopped the book down on onto her lap.

"I'm going to go and make some potions for us non-Charmed people." Pamela announced, heading for the attic door with her hands within her back pockets, striding out of the room in a quick pace.

"I'll come with you." Emma said, heading after Pamela with every intention to clear the air with the girl she used to cover for when she would come in late. She knew that Pamela would probably the hardest person to earn trust back from, as she had her mother's unforgiving attitude that made her such a respectable person.

As if he had sensed Emma leaving the room, Molron appeared with a set of wavering shimmers. Annabelle was the first to notice him, running towards the demon with her hand wide open, bringing forth energy ball and preparing to attack him, before he made a quick gesture with his hand, sending Annabelle flying across the room and causing her to crash into the dresser, glass from the cabinet doors smashing under her weight before she hit the floor unconscious. "Where's the higher being?" He growled.

"Go to hell!" Paige spat, trying to will the demon into the air in a similar fashion to what he had done to Annabelle, only to realize that her efforts were fruitless. Molron held out his palm, a dark blue fireball burst to life in his hand before he effortlessly flung it towards Paige. The instant the fireball connected with the witchlighter; there was a plume of flames that reduced Paige to a pile of lifeless ash on the floor within a second. Piper, too shocked to move, could only watch in horror as the same type of fireball flew in her direction. It struck her chest, enveloping her in the same flash fire that had consumed her sister before her incinerated remains fell to the floor.

"Did I mention I'm immune the parlour tricks of witches?" He smirked to Phoebe, who could only look back and forth from the two ash piles that had once been her sisters. "And now it's your turn…" He growled, conjuring another deadly fireball and throwing it towards the final Charmed One.

"No!" Brennan shouted. Emma and Pamela arrived back in the attic just in time to see the mutant jump in front of his wife, taking the fireball in the chest and spraying Phoebe with the resulting ash of her husband's remains. The middle Charmed One's hands began to shake as she began to grasp just what the chalky substance she was covered with was, before her body almost went into convulsions as she broke down.

"Damn family…" Molron spat, conjuring another fireball with every intention of hitting Phoebe this time around.

"NO!" Emma screamed with unbelievable volume as she realized who the two piles of ash before Brennan had been. A ripple of monumental energy pulsed from her body, making the very air distort from its magnitude. Molron was instantly vaporized with one final scream, not even leaving any evidence of his existence.

"Oh my… my…" Pamela babbled, her breathing becoming erratic as she ran towards the piles of ash that had once been her aunts, "Oh my God!" She screamed, dropping to her knees and grabbing desperate handfuls of the ash within her shaking palms as she wept hysterically into the floor, her body twitching now and again with her sobs.

"What happened…?" Emma breathed, tears falling from her eyes and rolling down her cheeks as she attempted to keep it together.

"You…" Phoebe growled, barely above a whisper, having found her voice and looking rather ghostly with ashes covering her face and body. "He was after you… He killed them…" She began to shake again, "He killed them… to get to you!" She bellowed, flying from the sofa, the Book of Shadows tumbling from her lap in the process, "They're dead because of you!" The remaining Charmed One wailed, lunging at Emma and pounding her chest with her fists, "This is all your fault! All… your… fault!" Phoebe couldn't keep up this level of voice for too long, as she eventually silenced, falling to the floor, clutching her stomach and weeping.

Emma stood, completely stunned. She knew that Phoebe was partially speaking out of her primary grief, but she knew that it had been true. Wordlessly, her head fell to the side as she vanished within a column of pink orbs that shot up through the ceiling.

* * *

Katrina watched with a sympathetic look as the same column of orbs that she had seen leave at the start of the day rose up through the sky. The rosy pink haze shot up through the vast array of stars, before culminating at Katrina's own height and forming Emma. She was a mere shadow of the person she had been before she left, tears dripping from her face as her head stayed lowered. "I told you it wasn't the right time…" Katrina said softly.

Emma didn't respond immediately, her shoulders shaking from her sobbing. Eventually, she looked up, her face tearstained and pale. "Fix it…" She croaked, her bottom lip quivering. "I'll stay here until its time… as long as you fix it. Altering reality… wiping memories… reverse time… I don't care. Just please…" She didn't finish her sentence, going back to sobbing quietly.

Wordlessly, Katrina raised her left hand and clicked her fingers. The small snapping noise seemed to echo through the endless space. The silence that followed afterwards seemed a little out of place, as both of the higher beings could sense time being shifted and felt as if it would be a little louder. "It is done…"

* * *

"I _cannot_ believe you dragged me here when I have so much to do at the restaurant. Opening night is six weeks away and I have not made the progress I wish I had, not to mention I have to juggle that with trying to find my husband, being a mother, being a Charmed One…" Piper hissed at the back of Annabelle's head. "I mean, who the hell hunts demons in the Underworld at seven thirty in the morning?"

Annabelle rolled her eyes in frustration, "Couldn't you have voiced this rant before we actually came down here?" She asked in an equally hushed voice as she peered around the edge of the bumpy cave wall. "First of all, _I_ hunt demons at seven thirty in the morning. I do it for a frickin' living. And second of all, this _will_ help you get Leo back. I did some research, and found out that there's an Oracle in these parts. She's supposed to be pretty powerful."

Piper groaned at the thought of dealing with this particular kind of demon, "Ugh… Oracles. All of them are such whores. Can't we find a Seer or a Soothsayer?" She asked with a sneer before letting an impatient sigh and striding into the chamber, letting out a curse when it was completely empty. "Okay, why did you have me hiding behind that column all that time when you could see it was empty?" She asked with wide eyes.

"Maybe because it's not empty." Annabelle replied, pulling a potion out of her pocket and flinging it over Piper's shoulder. The vial shattered on the ground, a cloud of pure white smoke flying up from the remains of glass and vanishing as it hit the ceiling. There was a white glow around the place the smoke had covered, before a blonde Oracle in an extremely glistening and revealing outfit was exposed standing in its place, a look of fear plastered on her face.

The demon tried to shimmer away, only to be frozen mid-escape by Piper, giving the Oracle a rather comical look, as her body looked as if it had been stretched out to the sides. Making a turning gesture with her hand, Piper unfroze the demon's head, laughing a little at the groan the Oracle emitted when she realized she was trapped in the middle of her transportation. "What kind of sorcery is this?" She spat, looking down at her wavering body.

"Witchcraft." Piper explained, clasping her hands calmly in front of her. "Here's the deal. You tell me what I want to know, and I don't blow up your body piece by piece. Especially since I'm really pissy in the morning and I don't like to see bloody stumps before my first coffee of the day." She warned, raising her hands in an offensive gesture, "What do you know about what happened to my husband?"

"I don't know what you're talking about… I swear." The Oracle growled back in response, actual fear showing in her eyes as she knew she didn't have the answer the witch was looking for.

"What are you swearing to, honey?" Piper said darkly, walking over to the demon in question until she was almost standing on her frozen feet. "God isn't exactly on your side. Mind you, it seems he hasn't been on mine either recently, so…" She made a quick flicking gesture, reducing the Oracle's left hand into dust and leaving a bleeding stump. The demon let out a high-pitched screech of pain, making Piper cringe from the intensity of the scream.

"I don't know anything!" The Oracle screamed, her face beginning to redden with a mixture of anger, pain, and fear.

"Now, you see, that just doesn't…" Piper trailed off, her look growing distant as she frowned deeply and put her hands on her hips, "Huh."

"Piper?" Annabelle asked cautiously, confused as to why the eldest Charmed One had halted in the middle of her interrogation. "What's wrong?"

"She doesn't know anything. This was waste of time." She replied flatly, quickly gesturing at the Oracle and blowing her up in a plume of vanquishing flames that rose up from the floor and consumed her at an incredible rate before completely blasting apart. "C'mon, let's go home…"

* * *

"Hey! Hey! What do you think you're doing?" Brennan exclaimed as he walked into the future bedroom of the little girl that was yet to be born, putting Connor down on the floor. Old curtains and bed sheets had been spread across the floor, while a warm spring breeze blew in through the window that had been fully opened. Phoebe stood at the wall to the right, haphazardly slapping white paint onto the wall with the thick paintbrush.

The middle Charmed One grinned at her husband and son, a small dot of white paint on the tip of her nose, while her stomach bulge stood out in her deep blue top against the white wall. "What does look like I'm doing? I'm… Whoa." Phoebe trailed off, putting the paintbrush down on the ladder. "Major Déjà vu…" She suddenly pointed towards her son, "Connor, don't even think about putting your hands on the wall. Don't give me that look. I know you were thinking about it!"

Connor gave his mother a wide eyed look, before casting a glance up at his father, "Uh… Phoebe, are you okay?" Brennan began, giving his wife a stare that suggested he thought there was something wrong with her. "Maybe it's the-,"

"It's not the fumes. I cracked a window." She cut him off, looking at the blank white wall and rubbing her forehead, "I've had this feeling before…" She whispered to herself, remembering the circumstances that had surrounded it the first time. The time Andy had died. "Um… I'm gonna go take a lie down. I don't think I got enough sleep last night. Could you finish up here, please?"

"Uh… yeah. Are you sure you're alright? You want me to bring you anything?" Brennan asked caringly as Phoebe passed him at the doorway. He planted a quick kiss on her right temple as she moved past him.

"Yeah. I'm fine. Don't worry about it…" Phoebe reassured him with a smile, giving a quick peck on the cheek as she left the nursery and headed for her own bedroom.

Once his mother was gone, Connor grinned. He immediately tore away from his father, his grin growing wider as he approached the immaculate white wall with his grubby hands, with every intention to get paint all over his palms. "Connor!" Phoebe's voice boomed from the other room. "Don't even think about it!"

* * *

"Oh yeah, very funny. Dad fell on his butt." Aidan said in a monotonous tone as he got himself up off the floor, sending a playful glare at his two daughters as they ate their cereal at the table. "Just you two wait, in about twenty years time, you're going to be doing this, and then you're going to be falling on your butts!" He said, grinning mischievously that showed where his children got it from.

"Thistle." Paige announced immediately as she strode into the kitchen, not even bothering to make a comment about the stench of the potion that was making the entire house stink.

"What?"

"A thistle." Paige said again, hitting her hands feverishly off the counter top, "It's what we've been missing all this time. I just came to me as soon as I woke up, I don't know why didn't think of it sooner!" She exclaimed excitedly, before moving towards Melinda at the kitchen table and lifting her up, spinning her around, "Guess what, sweetie? You're going to be using your powers all you want by the end of the day!"

Emma smiled at what she was hearing from her hiding space just outside the kitchen. She kept her back to the living room wall, hoping that no one would sense her presence. Even though her return had been a complete disaster, Katrina had been kind enough to let her come down and subliminally plant a thought in Paige's head. Even though it went against the rule that higher being's couldn't interfere with destiny. Smiling to herself once more, Emma vanished in a cloud of pink orbs that flew away from the house, as if she had never even been there.

* * *


	14. Earth, Wind, And Dire

**Earth, Wind, And Dire**

**10 Years Ago**

Aidan threw another icicle towards the gate of the Elemental Chamber. The glowing projectile collided with a demon just as it was making its way into the sanctum, vanquishing him immediately before he had even full formed out of the portal. Three more demons of the same kind tried to come through the portal. Aidan, knowing that he couldn't kill all three with icicles, raised his hands, releasing a chilling, cutting blizzard from his palms that tore through the evil beings instantly, killing them within a gout of cleansing flames that vanished back through the portal. "Couldn't we have done this at a better time?" He asked, rolling his eyes in Matt and Danielle's direction. "And why are you two doing nothing?"

"Because what better way to test your skills than to let you face your first convergence all by yourself? If you're lucky to survive for the next ten years, we'll help you at the next one." Danielle smirked, "If I had had my way, Skye would be here as well so she could use her powers to their full potential. No matter what Ruth says…" The redhead growled, folding her arms.

"Skye is ten years old, Danielle." Matt argued back calmly, "Ruth was our comrade for twenty years, just because her powers have been passed to her daughter, it doesn't mean she doesn't know what the convergence entails. You can't blame her for wanting to protect her child, can you?" He asked rhetorically.

"If she had had any sense, she wouldn't have had kids to begin with." Danielle spat back, keeping her eyes on the portal to make sure nothing else was coming through, "Our lives are too dangerous for children, and since Ruth doesn't have her powers anymore, she won't be able to protect Skye when demons come after her abilities. That's the one thing Aidan and I can agree upon…"

"Definitely." Aidan clarified, hurling a sphere of compressed water towards one of the demons that was coming through, vanquishing it by drowning it. "You're going to have to hold a gun to my head before I would even think about having kids! Even then, I'm not sure I would do it."

"Oh, I don't know…" Matt said airily, smirking knowingly, "You may not even have a choice in the matter…"

* * *

**Present Day**

"Is she actually going to release that arrow anytime soon?" Phoebe hissed to Aidan, who was sitting on top of the backyard table while the middle Charmed One sat in one of the chairs that were around the table itself. "And why is she doing this barefoot?" She whispered again, grinning at Melinda, who was sitting contently in her father's lap, snuggling into his chest.

"She's doing it to connect with her element better." Aidan replied in the same hushed voice, holding his daughter securely as she nodded off, sucking her thumb in an adorable fashion, "Although, honestly? I think the only thing she's connecting with is the earthworm between her toes." He said, trying to contain his laughter.

"Why, in God's name, has she got her eyes closed?" Annabelle breathed with disbelieve. "How does she expect to fire an arrow if she isn't even looking at the damn target? What was the point in me even trying to teach her?"

Piper stood in the middle of the Manor's back yard. Her bare feet were sinking into the damp grass from the rain last night, and covering them in watery dirt from the ground. Her eyes were closed in deep concentration as she held an arrow firmly in place in the bow she was holding. It was Cybele's Bow, the legendary weapon of an earth elemental, as Apollo's Axe had morphed into its new form once Piper had become part of the elemental quad. It was intricately decorated with carvings that were supposed to look like branches from a tree, with delicate leaf shapes at the edges. Finally, she released the string, letting the arrow fly, only for it to spin onto the floor, "Damnit!"

"Oh, honey…" Phoebe cooed, cringing as she tried to comfort her sister from afar, "You almost got it that time. I can tell!" She smiled, before whispering to her younger sister's husband. "Couldn't you have helped her before the convergence? Especially with a freaking tidal wave heading towards the city!" She hissed.

"I didn't know about the tidal wave!" He whispered back, watching as Annabelle made her way across to Piper to help her reload the bow. "Look, my knowledge on this whole ritual is a little hazy. I was never meant to lead the elementals! You know, my life was so much less complicated before it became 'Charmed'. Do you know we've gone through three elementals since I met Paige?"

"Okay, from what I hear, Matt's death was no one's fault. Danielle was a homicidal maniac, who, by the way, you took down yourself, and Grant, well… yeah, that kinda was our fault, but that is so not the point. You're the most powerful, not to mention the most experienced out of all four of you. You need to step up!" Phoebe said, punching the air slightly with her fists, before realizing she had to keep quiet for her slumbering niece, "Sorry, little one…"

"You know what?" Piper seethed, hurling the bow and arrow to the ground, "This is a crock. This is an honest to God, crock." She spat, "How do you expect me to clam down and concentrate on firing a little arrow at a tree when a God knows how tall wall of water is heading towards the city? Just how much do you know about this convergence anyway?"

"It's sorta hard to explain…" Aidan said, narrowing his eyes in thought. "Basically, our powers have a breakdown. Our hold over the elements of nature diminishes, and only place we do have power is in the Elemental Chamber. But since it's our powers that keep it cloaked and protected from demons…"

"They can get in?" Annabelle offered, "But why the tidal wave? I mean, I know the elements go out of control when one of you is killed, but if all of your powers are gone, doesn't that mean the weather should just be… well, dull?" She asked with a deadpan tone.

"Honestly? I have no idea. But every convergence, a different element becomes extremely elevated in power. Do you remember around ten years ago when San Francisco had that unbelievable heat wave around this time of year?" Aidan asked, looking to Piper and Phoebe, who had been in this city their whole lives.

"Remember? Are you kidding me? Paige and I made bets on whether or not it was possible to roast a chicken on the sidewalk. Needless to say, we ate it that night. And the soles of my favourite sneakers melted too… I take it that was the fire element being elevated?" Piper asked with a cocked eyebrow.

"Yeah."

"Okay, well, if that's true, shouldn't there be a tidal wave every forty years? I don't think there has been. Hell, tidal waves are rare, and even then they only hit the East Coast. We just get earthquakes and storms coming in from the ocean." Phoebe stated, shifting into a more comfortable position.

"Well, it's not an equal cycle. The last time the water element was elevated was centuries ago. Earth and fire have been the ones that have had the most activity, with a few hurricanes in between. Speaking of which, shouldn't we start transporting all our stuff to Atlantis? I mean, you guys will be staying there tonight in case of water damage, right?" Aidan looked between his two sisters in law, waiting for an answer.

"Yeah, although I'd feel a lot safer if this damn convergence hadn't taken away my witch powers as well. Am I really expected to use that stupid bow against a horde of demons that you said will be coming into the Elemental Chamber?" Piper asked with a raised eyebrow, gesturing angrily at the bow on the ground.

"You'll have your powers in the chamber. I've already said this." Aidan replied with slight frustration, "Now, come on, you need to get that thing mastered. We have a lot of work to do."

* * *

Paige muscled her way through the hysterical crowd of people with an aggravated sigh. How she had ended up doing supply shopping for the whole family was beyond her, but as long as she was here, she was going to do her best. Holding onto the box of chips tightly in her arms, she tried to make her way back to the shopping cart, where Brennan was standing, his eyes wide with alertness as he watched for anyone who might try and steal anything from the cart out of desperation.

"Okay, how did we end up pulling the short straws for this job?" Paige asked , dropping the chips into the large shopping cart and nearly falling in herself when someone rushed past her, ramming their cart into her hip in the process, "My God, one little tidal wave and people just go crazy!"

"Yeah, well, that's what happens when you live in a city that's only had earthquakes for the last few centuries." Brennan replied with a smirk, "Okay, I went and got one of those giant bottles of apple juice." He said, tapping the top of what looked like a plastic keg in the large shopping cart. "A big bag of potatoes, and diapers."

"Diapers?"

"In case all this stress makes Phoebe go into early labour. We gotta be prepared." He explained, hitting the big packet of Huggies and offering Paige a large grin, to which he got a patronizing blank look in return.

"Bren, you're going to be living in a castle for the next week. We are all going to be living in the lap of luxury. The only thing Phoebe will have to worry about is tearing herself out of bed and away from the unbelievably comfortable mattresses!" Paige's eyes seemed to roll to the back of her head at the very thought. "C'mon, all we need now is one of those big bags of pasta." She cringed as she turned around, seeing a fight break out over the last bag of apples. "C'mon, I want to get outta here!"

"Amen to that…" The mutant said, gripping the handle of the cart tightly and preparing to navigate through the crazed shoppers, all trying to stock up before they evacuated the city for higher ground.

After much weaving and ducking when an argument over watermelons got particularly violent, the two of them came across the right aisle, only to find that there was only one back of pasta left. "Alright, no one's looking, just quickly TK it over here so we don't need to go through all these people…" Brennan murmured to Paige, making her smile at the thought.

"Gotcha…" She whispered back, willing the sack of pasta towards the two of them with her powers and causing it to quickly slide along the shelf towards the two of them. "Grab it." The witchlighter ordered. Just as Brennan reached for it, the sack seemed to fly to the other end of the shelf once again, "Hey, don't look at me! I didn't do that!" Paige protested when Brennan glared at her.

"Well, try again." He urged.

"Aren't you a little curious about how it went back to that end of the shelf?" She asked, before she spotted someone in the crowd heading towards them with a sack of pasta in their cart, "Pam!" She suddenly bellowed, striding towards the twenty year old was pushing a cart past her.

Pamela visibly tried to speed up, but with crowded aisles that made maneuvering impossible, she only got so far before her aunt caught up. She felt a tap on her shoulder, and cringed as she turned around, "Paige! Oh, hey! Hi! I didn't see you there…" She said, moving a little so the witchlighter wouldn't see the sack of pasta in her cart.

"Hmm… Oh, really? Is that before or after you stole my pasta?" She spat, nodding her head in the direction of the sack that had been intercepted from Brennan's hands. "What the hell are you even doing here, anyway? You live on the other side of the country and Piper said you weren't coming."

"Um…" Pamela bit her lip, "It's really complicated. Hey, Brennan." She greeted her uncle warmly as he made his way towards him with his equally full shopping cart. "Look, could you guys just forget you ever saw me? I'm not here for you anyway…" She clarified, before groaning at the information she had just let slip.

"Pam…" Paige began, folding her arms and putting on her best scolding expression that she used with her children, "What's going on?"

* * *

Piper let out a sigh as she looked around her empty kitchen. They had had plenty warning for the tidal wave, so everything she owned had been packed away into many boxes that were now in equally empty living room, being transported via a spell from Phoebe. She jumped up onto the counter, her legs dangling off the side as she stared down at the floor with a sad look. She had lost her husband, her powers for the time being, and now she was being forced out of her house by a natural disaster. Was there anything that was going right in her life?

"Okay, that's everything we all own transported to Atlantis." Phoebe announced as she walked into the kitchen, "We'll send away the cars when Brennan and Paige get back from the supermarket with your car and when Aidan gets back with Skye and Maxwell in his car. Apart from those, the only thing left is the Book of Shadows, which we're probably better transporting personally in case a demon were to intercept a spell… Are you alright? Because it looks like you're not really listening to what I'm saying."

Piper looked up, giving her sister a blank look for a few moments before snapping out of it, "Oh, yeah, I was listening. Cars, book, got it…" She replied absentmindedly, tugging at the sleeve of her shirt a little as she turned away from her sister, looking out the window.

"Leo?" Phoebe suggested quietly, walking forward and laying her hands on her sister's knees, making Piper in return, rest palms on top of her younger sibling's, "It's okay to miss him, you know. Actually, to be honest, you're taking the whole thing a lot better than I expected." She confessed, knowing from experience and from what she could sense that Piper wasn't the strongest of people when it came to emotions.

"It's not just that." The eldest Charmed One admitted, turning towards her sister, "First, my husband vanishes, my powers have been taken away by this convergence, and now I'm losing this house… Everything is slipping through my fingers and there's not a damn thing I can do about it." She suddenly clutched onto Phoebe's hands tightly, "Pheebs, do you know you're the only thing that has been constant in my life for the past twelve and a half years?" Her bottom lip quivered with sadness and fear, "Please don't leave me too…"

Pulling on her sister's hands, Phoebe dragged Piper back onto her feet, before wrapping her arms tightly around the eldest Halliwell's torso and hugging her, "I promise that I'm not going anywhere." She whispered, getting a little emotional herself, "Hell, I don't think you could get rid of me even if you wanted to!" She joked, making them chuckle, "It's going to be all three of us at the end, and even after that, we'll stick together. You, me, and Paige." She placed her hands on the sides of Piper's head, stroking her hair, "And I also promise that we will get Leo back. Just be strong for a little bit longer, okay? I know you can do it."

"Alright…" Piper replied meekly, before pulling up her mood and smirking confidently, "There are two things I know that won't be slipping through my fingers anytime soon though!" She said brightly, "The restaurant. With eight inch storm glass, that place is going to be as dry as a bone, even after the tidal wave, and the club is far enough inland to not sustain any damage."

"Good!" Phoebe said just as happily. "You see? Things are still all good. Just keep your chin up. We're here for you if you need us, even if it's just babysitting, because I start maternity leave in a fortnight, so I'm going to need something to pass the time."

A loud curse coming from the back door seemed to destroy the mood as Brennan came in, carrying everything that he was able. He dropped the bags on the floor, wiping his brow before noticing the two sisters standing in the kitchen, "Hey, do you know how much the guys down at the tills at that place are getting paid for working today? Quadruple double time! Not to mention they were allowed to come in before opening hours and get first pickings at supplies… Am I interrupting something?" He asked uncertainly, seeing that Piper's eyes were slightly red and puffy.

"Um… no, you're not." Phoebe replied, turning around, "Do you want any help getting the rest of the car, hon?" She asked sweetly, walking towards him and folding her arms over her stomach bulge, peering into the large plastic carrier bags. "Is Paige bringing the rest in? Maybe we should and help her."

"Paige isn't with me." Brennan said immediately, "She had to go and take care of something at work. She said it something like moving all the files up to the top floor for minimum damage." He lied; silently wishing Paige hadn't ran off with Pamela.

"You're lying." Phoebe replied confidently, "And before you bitch at me for invading your privacy, I'm not." She assured him, knowing that Brennan would instantly accuse her of using her powers on him, "You're just a terrible liar." She narrowed her eyes, "What's going on?"

* * *

"I will tell what's going on if you shut up and stop asking me every five seconds!" Pamela spat back at her aunt, who had repeated the same question around seven times since they had left the supermarket. The younger witch turned the wheel of the pick up she was driving, turning into the driveway of a small bungalow that was part of one of the city's nicest and quietest suburbs.

"Well, forgive me for being confused, but you show up here when you're supposed to be on the other side of the country, you're driving a pick up which I'm a little scared about not knowing where it came from, and now we're turning into a driveway that has some guy nailing wooden boards over the windows." Paige ranted, gesturing to the man that was just finishing covering the front window of the small house.

"He's not just 'some guy'." Pamela said rather defensively as she got out of the car, "His name is Keith." She informed her aunt, walking up the path to the front door and kissing the man on the cheek, while a perplexed Paige followed her. "Keith, this is my Aunt Paige. Aunt Paige, Keith." She droned, clearly not liking using Paige's proper title as a family member.

"Oh…" Keith gaped a little, "Um… it's nice to meet you. I've heard a lot about you and your sisters. All good, don't worry." He said, flashing Paige a charming toothy grin that made Pamela inwardly smirk, knowing that her boyfriend was already working the odd way he had with women.

"Oh... thanks, I guess. I've heard nothing about you, though!" Paige said with a nervous grin, hating to admit to herself she had to stop herself from looking straight into his eyes, as from what she had seen with a glimpse, any self respect she had would be lost the moment eye contact was made.

"Later." Pamela said through bared teeth, before her expression softened as she looked up to Keith, who was considerably taller than her, "Do you know how they're getting on in there? Or have you been busy covering all the windows?" She asked him in a harmonious tone that stunned her aunt.

"I dunno. They haven't come out since you left to get supplies." He replied.

"Pam!" A booming voice suddenly exclaimed from the front door. Paige looked past her niece to see that a rather stout old woman was standing on the front step. Her graying hair was pulled back into a small ponytail, where streaks of dark down could be seen. Her withered features seemed to express kindness and wisdom, along with her striking blue eyes that bore an uncanny resemblance to Pamela's. "Oh, honey. Thank goodness you're back! I thought you may have been attacked by one of those desperate loons down at the supermarket."

Pamela smiled warmly at the woman as she turned towards her, "Don't worry, Grandma. I know how to take care of myself." She said to her reassuringly, "I got all the stuff you wanted. Is Grandpa ready to haul ass yet?"

This use of language seemed to trigger a small hit on the arm from the old woman, "Now, I don't like you using that kind of language." She suddenly turned into the house, shouting with the same tone she had used when heralding Pamela, "Arnold! Are you ready to haul ass?" She boomed, giving her granddaughter a sly wink. "I swear, if we get caught in that tidal wave just because he couldn't find those old police badges, I'll-,"

"Found it! Cool your jets, Deirdre," A man's voice came from inside the house. He walked onto the front step, next to his wife, holding the police badges up to the light. The man seemed to have the same sort of kindly aura that the woman had. His soft brown eyes looked at the glimmering gold of the metallic shields, "I found mine almost instantly." He said to both his wife and Pamela, "But I had to go and get Andrew's. I had it in a safe place." He continued, running a hand over the badge that had once belonged to his deceased son, "Here you go, Pam. You keep it safe."

Pamela stood in momentary shock as her grandfather offered the shield to her. She stared at it for a few seconds, before the glimmering light disappeared from its surface as the sun was covered by a dark cloud. She looked, biting her lip in slight fear, before taking the badge and putting it in her back pocket, "C'mon. You two had better get outta here before the wave hits." She said strongly.

"Alright…" Deirdre said sadly, "Are you sure you're going to be alright? I mean, we can squeeze into the pick up with four people…" She looked past Pamela, seeing Paige awkwardly fidgeting, "… Well, we could try five, I guess." The old woman said uncertainly.

"Oh, no, don't worry, ma'am." Paige said with a smile, "I'll be fine. I've got some transport out of the city, its ready when I am. I just came to see my…" She looked towards her niece, deciding that this wasn't the time to complicate things with more relatives, "My friend, Pam." She finished.

"Yeah, Paige is going to be fine, as will Keith and I. You two go, I'll see you at the hotel tomorrow, okay? I'll come by and check on you." She took the old woman's hand, gently helping her down the front step and towards the pick up truck.

"We'll lock up for you. Don't worry about it." Keith announced, patting Arnold on the shoulder as he passed him, heading for his truck. The old man passed his keys to the mutant, who clutched them tightly to show that he could be trusted with them.

Pamela watched at the pick up truck turned the corner out of the street. From here, there was a perfect view of the Golden Gate Bridge, and it could be seen just how much traffic was trying to get across it. She turned around towards the sea, where dark storm clouds were gathering on the horizon where she knew a gigantic wave was making its way towards her. It was funny how she had stood against the toughest demons, nearly died countless times, and yet this was the thing that scared her the most. The fact that everything she had grown up around, all her memories could be destroyed with one foul twist of nature.

The city could be rubble by the end of the day.

* * *

The air was still in the backyard of Halliwell Manor. The only signs of movement being the slightest swaying of the leaves on the trees as an actual calm before the storm began to settle in. The short grass wasn't even affected by the wind which was as strong as a person's last breath. Everything stood still, before there was a faint whistling that seemed to cut through the silence like a knife. An arrow flew into the tree trunk at such a velocity that the tip reappeared on the other side, cleanly creating a circular hole in the tree itself.

Piper stood in both shock and triumph at what she had just accomplished, "I did it…" She breathed, lowering her bow and looking at the end of the golden arrow contrasting against the dark brown bark. A grin spread across her face as she turned to her fellow elementals. "Did you see that? I did that!" She repeated, resisting the urge to squeal like a child and jump up and down wildly.

"Hooray!" Skye said with a roll of her eyes, standing up from the table and walking towards Piper, fixing her elemental gauntlets along the way. "Do you feel stronger? Even just a little?" She said, briefly glancing at the bow in Piper's hands.

Before the eldest Charmed One could reply, the arrow, which had been embedded in the tree a moment ago, suddenly went into reverse and flew back towards them, slowing down to a gently pace and floating into Piper's hand. She stared down at the weapon in her palm in shock, "I thought we didn't have our powers on this day." She said, looking up at Skye for an explanation.

"The power isn't yours, it's the weapon's. If the arrow is lost, it'll come back to the bow. If the arrow is destroyed, a new one will be conjured in its place so that you're never without a way to defend yourself." She clarified. "It's the same with these gauntlets." She held her hands up, showing off the weapons of an air elemental, "I could still throw a twenty mile an hour wind with these things on. It's a fraction of my power, but if we get attacked while we're not in the Elemental Chamber, it'll come in useful."

"Speaking of which…" Aidan began, also rising to his feet. "We should get Annabelle to transport us to the Chamber, if we pull our power there; we may be able to lessen the tidal wave's power a little." He said, before frowning, "Speaking of transportation, has Phoebe got an answer from Brennan about where Paige is?"

Piper shrugged at the question, before suddenly reloading the bow at an incredible speed and firing it once again, this time making the arrow go even deeper into the tree trunk. She smiled to herself, "I guess once you get it the first time, that'll you need…" She smirked as the arrow flew back to her hand, ready to be reloaded again.

"I'll go check…" Aidan murmured to himself, turning on his heel and heading into the house.

The moment he stepped in the door, a loud thud caught the elemental's ears. Immediately thinking about the safety of the children, he moved into the kitchen as fast as he could, only to find Annabelle struggling to help Maxwell to his feet, as it seemed the fire elemental had fell to the floor, along with the Book of Shadows, which was also on the ground.

"What the hell happened?" He asked, clearly aghast at the chaos in the kitchen as a potion pot suddenly exploded, letting out a plume of black smoke that set off the smoke detector while the pot in question seemed to have burst from the force of the explosion, rips in the stainless steel viciously ruining the makeshift cauldron.

"I don't know. I was making vanquishing potions for the fight later; he walked in, looked at what I was doing and then just… fell! He knocked the book of the counter in the process." She said, nodding at the fallen tome on the floor that had somehow managed to land perfectly closed, an odd glimmer of green coming from the silver triquetra that Aidan was sure was just a trick of the eye.

"Ugh… What happened?" Maxwell groaned, putting a hand to his forehead and moving his unkempt black hair away from his face, "I feel like I've just been hit on the head with a sledgehammer…" He groaned, wordlessly taking the helping that was given to him as Aidan and Annabelle pulled him to his feet.

"Yeah, you took a pretty hard fall, buddy." Aidan said, moving out the taller man's way to let him pass into the back garden, "Go wait with Skye. We're ready to go in just a minute."

"Oh? So Piper actually mastered Cybele's Bow? Good for her." Maxwell commented, looking around the kitchen with a confused gaze before heading for the back door, leaving Annabelle to shove her hands into her pockets and move towards her ruined potion.

"Ugh, there's no point in making a fresh batch. Anything that does come through will probably go down pretty easily." She droned, before watching intently as Aidan picked up the Book of Shadows and returned safely to the counter. She stared at the book for a few seconds. "Um… I'll be out in a minute. Just gimme a sec to clean this up, Piper will go crazy if I don't."

"Okay," Aidan said warily, casting a suspicious glance over the mercenary as she began to clean up the apparent mess her potion had made, "Try and hurry. I want to weaken the tidal wave as much as I can before it hits. If we're lucky, we can have it fade away before it gets here."

"Will do." She said, not looking up from the sink as she poured the remains of the potions down the drain, shaking the pot a little to get every last drop out.

Aidan left, and the moment she heard the back door shut, Annabelle calmly placed the potion pot back down on the counter. It still had a thin layer of the potion on the bottom. Casting narrowed eyes around the kitchen, she put her finger into the mixture, dipping the tip and bringing it to her mouth, smirking a little as she did. "Perfect." She purred, striding confidently towards the back door, casually running her hand over the Book of Shadows as she passed it, not noticing the angry green glow that exuded from the triquetra at her very touch.

* * *

"How long have you known about them?" Paige murmured softly from the back seat of Keith's car as they drove towards the Manor. The streets were dead. Everyone seemed to have evacuated, which thankfully meant that there would be no casualties if they weren't able to stop the tidal wave.

Pamela shrugged her shoulders, "A while, I guess. Ever since I found out who my Dad was." Neither of the women noticed Keith shift even more to the left, to give the impression that he was trying not to listen to an obviously private conversation. "I was a little curious to see if the other side of my family was just as freaky as the other side."

"You've known Andy was your father for years. Why didn't you tell us? Or at least Piper, if my math is correct, you would have found out when I moved out and you moved in." Paige questioned, glancing at the back of Keith's head and silently thanking him for keeping out of this matter.

"Did you need to know? It was my business and had nothing to do with you guys." Pamela replied rather defensively, "Besides, I knew about them for ages and never acted on it. I was afraid that they would be horrible people and I would have to come home and tell you all what a crashing failure it had been."

"But _we're_ your family, first and foremost." Paige said back to her in a rather offended tone.

"You're not my _only_ family." Pamela spat back, whipping her head around to glare at her aunt. "I have two other uncles and three little cousins that I've never met; did you know that, _Aunt_ Paige?

"No." Paige replied flatly. "Why would I? Most of the things we know about you, we've heard them from every source _but_ you. So forgive us for not suddenly realizing the desire to seek out other family members!"

A tense silence filled the car for the next ten minutes as Keith leisurely turned through the winding roads of San Francisco. He had made a move to put the radio on, but as soon as his hand had left the steering wheel, he decided he was against it, with his girlfriend tearing at her fingernails in a passive aggressive manner. Paige had taken a different form of anger, choosing to curse and swear and scream loudly, but only in her head. To everyone else, she just looked extremely tense.

A shrill ringing suddenly broke the quiet as Pamela's cell phone informed her of an incoming call. With an angry sigh, she threw her hand into her jean pocket and pulled out her cell, quickly answering. "Hello?"

"Pam…?" Deirdre's clearly panicked voice managed to breath down the receiver, quickly followed by a whimper.

"Grandma?" Pamela immediately sat up in the seat, sensing the urgency in her grandmother's tone, "What is it? What's wrong? You guys should at least be over the bridge by now."

Her response came in a shaky voice that was barely audible, "Your-your Grandpa… We stopped at the ATM to ge-get some cash… The-th-these people… They held up a gun. Arnold refused to give them the money he'd withdrawn…" She broke into a choked sob, "It's really bad, Pammy!" She wailed.

Pamela's eyes were wide with fear, "Just hold on. Where are you?"

It took a few moments for the old woman to regain her composure to inform the twenty year old of her location, "The Federal Reserve Bank… Please, hurry! My cell keeps cutting out when I try to call 911!"

The witch snapped her phone shut, "The Federal Reserve Bank. Step on it!" She pleaded with Keith, who could only give her a confused look as he shrugged.

"Hey, this is my first time in San Francisco. I don't know my way around! What the hell is wrong? Is it your grandparents?" He said, stopping at the car as he came to a junction, preparing to go full speed as soon as Pamela gave him a direction.

"Um… Right!"

"No."

Pamela and Keith turned around to see that Paige had seemed to have braced herself in the backseat, with her arms stretching so that they touched either side of the car. "Don't move the car. At all." She ordered calmly.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Pamela shouted at her aunt, knowing that every second was vital.

"Trying to prove that I'm not against you finding your family!" She barked back, before scrunching up her eyes. The car and its inhabitants were devoured in a giant cloud of bright twinkling lights that covered all the windows, blinding the three of them a little before they vanished, revealing that the car was in a different place. "Take the left. It's right round there."

Keith frowned, turning back to the road and realizing that the car really was closer to the shoreline. "Alright!" He said confidently, pushing down on the accelerator and wheeling the car around the corner, immediately spotting Deirdre kneeling in front of the large bank with someone lying on the ground in front of her.

Pamela was already opening the car door before the vehicle had come a complete stop. She ran towards her grandparents, her heart nearly stopping when she saw that Deirdre was on her knees, her trousers soaked with the blood pouring from Arnold's bullet wound. "Oh my God!" She shrieked, kneeling down at her grandfather's other side. "We need to call 911!"

"All I get is this crackling noise!" Deirdre wailed back, holding up her cell phone with a shaking hand before going back to cradling her husband's head. "Please, stay with me…" She pleaded in a whisper, stroking the side of his pale face.

A faint rumbling could be heard. It seemed to run through the ground itself, sending unpleasant vibrations through Pamela as she could feel it run through her entire body from her kneeling position. All the colour drained from her face as she looked towards the ocean, her mouth falling open with shock and terror as her tear filled eyes widened.

A tidal wave of unknown height could now be clearly seen heading towards the city at a vicious rate, ripping through the ocean and somehow consuming it, growing in strength and size even more. Dark storm clouds seemed to accompany it, casting a dark, foreboding grey over the horizon. It really did look like Hell was about to be unleashed on San Francisco.

"Okay, we need to get inside. Now!" Paige suddenly stated, also noticing the destructive natural disaster heading towards them, and beginning to try and help Arnold to his feet so they could pull him into safety.

Keith pushed and pulled fruitlessly against the door handle, "It's not opening! It must be locked electronically or something!" He said with frustration, knowing that if their powers weren't a secret from the Trudeaus, he could just run right through the glass door without any injury whatsoever.

"Uh… no! You were just pulling it. You need to push it" Paige lied, forcing her will on the lock and causing it to telekinetically falter for a split second. That was all that was needed, as the glass door fell open. "Okay, go, go, go! Try and find the money vault! It should be at the back!"

Thankfully, Deirdre was too distracted by the impending death of her husband to notice the fact that Keith had seemed to vanish in the blink of an eye, only leaving a breeze in his wake. "Found it!" His voice came from the back of the building, causing Paige and Pamela to rush to where his voice had come from, all the while aware that the rumbling was getting louder.

"How did you get the door open so quickly?" Deirdre asked breathlessly, as Keith stood next to the iron door that looked like it weighed a literal ton.

"Uh… What can I say? I move fast." He said with a smile.

"Okay! In! Go!" Paige urged, moving to the back of the vault with Pamela and gently laying Arnold down on the floor. She turned around to see that the tidal wave was a mere second away from the city, therefore mere seconds away from them. "Keith! Close the door!" She shouted, timing her telekinetic assistance perfectly as Keith pulled on the giant turning handle, bringing the door to a close, and with the combination of their powers, turning the cog-like handle so the door would stay shut.

They sat in silence, the only sounds were the wheezy coughs that Arnold would occasionally splutter out, the echoing rumbles coming from the outside as the massive wall of water collided with the various structures that met its path, and Deirdre's sobs as she held her dying husband.

"Whoa!" Keith yelped, stepping back from the large steel door as a small amount of water gushed through the bottom of the door, flooding the vault with a thin layer of liquid before it stopped, the rumbles getting quieter as the tidal wave began to pass the city by.

Pamela knelt beside her grandfather, her jeans soaked with a mixture of blood and water, while her face was soaked with silent tears as she could feel his soul beginning to leave his body. Looking up, she shot a pleading look at her aunt, looking between her and the fatal bullet wound in the right side of Arnold's chest, "Paige…" She whispered hoarsely, "Please…"

Paige's composure instantly turned a lot more serious as she unfolded her arms, moving closer to the three Trudeaus on the floor, "Do they know...?" She asked monotonously, slowly kneeling down next to Arnold and flexing her fingers.

Pamela hesitated, looking towards her grandmother's confused look before slowly shaking her head, "No…"

Paige pursed her lips tightly, taking a deep breath, "Well, they're about to…" She said strongly, "Please don't be afraid." She asked Deirdre kindly; giving her a warm smile before holding her hands out over Arnold's wound. She glared at the wound, and a scream of pain reverberated off the walls of the small vault as the bullet was telekinetically pulled from the wound, landing in Paige's hand. She instantly threw it away, holding both her hands out and releasing a bright golden glow from her palms that made Deirdre fall back in shock. The healing light worked its magic immediately, making the gushing blood reverse its flow and return to Arnold's body, before stitching up his wound completely, not even leaving a hole in his shirt.

Arnold took a large gasp of breath as he sat up, instantly jumped upon by his deliriously happy wife, who hugged him tightly, babbling quietly to him and kissing him on the cheek, "An angel…" She breathed, before looking to Paige with tears in her eyes and a smile of disbelief, "You must be an angel from the heavens."

"Um… not exactly…"

* * *

The four elementals instantly broke hands as they felt the tidal wave pass over the danger area. In their concentrated state, all they had focused on was extending their will towards San Francisco, blocking out the harmonic tones of the Angel's Melody. Now, however, the soothing song of the Elemental Chamber crashed against their ears, along with the various screams of pain coming from the demons that were being vanquished by Brennan, Annabelle, and Phoebe.

"Phoebe! Would you just stay back and attack from there? You're in danger enough as it is!" Brennan bellowed, swirling his wrists and summoning a mass of violently crackling electricity into his hands, hurling it towards the demon that was coming through the portal and vanquishing it instantly in a spray of flames and sparks.

"I can't do a thing if you keep getting in the way of my shot! If you hadn't ducked in time, that psionic blast would have given you a massive brain hemorrhage!" The middle Charmed One spat back, a white glow growing on her forehead before she fired a globe of mental energy towards a demon that had just came through the portal, spinning twin swords. The psionic blast struck him in the head, causing him to let out a blood curdling scream as it threw him back and off the plateau, hurling him into the dark, mysterious water below, "Hey, Aidan. What the hell _is_ that water down there?"

"It cleanses souls, and brings out the best in people. But with demons, there's no soul to cleanse, so it kills them." The elemental replied, spinning his forearm around and summoning a sphere of frost into his hand, ready to attack, "Okay, guys. The tidal wave's beginning to diffuse, which means the convergence is almost over. This portal will close any minute soon, so let's end this."

"I'm all for that!" Maxwell said with a grin, repeating the arm movement Aidan had made and bringing forth a plume of bright orange flames.

"I think I'll just stick with my hands." Piper droned, keeping her relaxed posture as she could call on her powers instantly if she wanted to, and had no need to take any of the measures everyone else was taking.

The portal glowed an angry red, as opposed to its tranquil blue, before what could only be described as a blur flew out of it. The creature instantly flew for Annabelle, tackling her to the ground beginning to passionately slash as her face and neck with its talons. It was a hideous beast, with tough leathery skin that was a sickly grey colour. Its bat-like wings beat furiously as it attacked the mercenary, while it let out a shriek from its deformed mouth that sent a shiver down everyone's spine.

Aidan and Maxwell send their respective elements towards the beast, the extreme cold and unbelievable heat hitting it in its right side, throwing it off Annabelle instantly and almost throwing it into the cleansing waters, before it beat its wings and took flight, heading for Annabelle yet again.

"Son of a bitch!" She seethed, throwing out an energy ball that was easily dodged with an impressive aerial barrel roll, "Piper, blast the piece of shit!" She screamed, before the beast was on her again, slashing wildly at her already wounded face.

Piper, for some reason, stood frozen, only watching as the demon viciously assaulted her friend. Her hands remained in her pockets, looking on as everyone else seemed to attack the beast with everything they had, only for it to regroup itself and fly for Annabelle once again. Just what was going on?

There was a low hum that broke through the air, bringing everyone's attention towards the portal. It was beginning to swirl, picking up momentum as it slowly shrank the faster the spinning got. The demon, seeing the portal beginning to close, made one last attack on Annabelle, digging its claws into the side of her face and dragging them down her cheek, causing the blonde let out a scream of unbelievable pain, before it pounced off of her, hurling itself at the portal and getting through just as it closed, vanishing in a flash of light.

"Wow… talk about a demon with a one track mind! I wonder why it only went after you…" Skye exclaimed, kneeling down and slowly helping Annabelle to her feet, "We had better get her to Paige." She turned to Aidan, "You can only heal wounds caused by fire or heat, not talons."

"Which brings us back to where the hell is Paige?" Phoebe said, glaring at her husband who hadn't told them anything about Paige's location, "I swear, if she's hurt somewhere, I will-,"

"Relax! She's fine." Brennan said, "See? Aidan isn't freaking out like you are, probably because he's been able to sense her this entire time." He said, looking towards his brother in law for confirmation, "Am I right?"

Aidan let out a guilty sigh, cringing under Phoebe's glare, "Sorry, Phoebe. But he's right." He tried to salvage his statement the moment her eyes widened to the size of dinner plates, "Look, if I had sensed pain, terror, or nothing at all, I would have gone to her immediately, you know that!"

"Just know that if it wasn't for my being pregnant, I would leap on you and claw your eyes out for stringing me along all this time!" She said playfully, before noticing that her older sister seemed to be out of sorts, "Piper, you okay? You sorta clamped up a little back there…"

"Hmm…?" She looked up, blinking a few times before realizing that she was being addressed, "Oh yeah, me? I'm fine." She looked past her sister, to where the portal had once stood, "Absolutely fine…"

* * *

Paige wearily made her way into the royal bedroom of the Atlantian Castle. She looked around the dark room, with only a sliver of moonlight peeking through the clouds and shining through the tall window lighting her way as she moved towards the bed, frowning when she saw it was empty. She thought Aidan would have gone to bed hours ago.

She suddenly saw something out of the corner of her eye and turned to the window, smiling when she could see a limp arm hanging over the edge of the couch. She couldn't see who was lying on it, as the back was too high, but a small grunt instantly identified the person for her as she made her way towards the couch.

Aidan was sleeping soundly on the sofa, sprawled out in his just his boxers as he scratched his chest in his sleep, letting out another small grunt and turning towards Paige, making her smile. He had obviously tried to wait up for her.

"Hey…" She murmured softly, kneeling down and gently resting her chin on his shoulder as he woke up, surveying her with tired green eyes, "There room on this sofa for two?" She asked with a smile. Instead of getting a verbal response, Aidan merely patted the sofa, signaling for Paige to clamber on and lazily lay her arm across stomach as she laid her head on his chest, "You should have just gone to bed. Don't you have a shift in like…?" She looked at her watch, her eyes widening, "Half an hour ago?"

"Nah…" He replied with a raspy voice, obviously a symptom of being asleep for so long, "Got enough warning on the tidal wave with my powers… Managed to change my shift…" He was beginning to wake up a little, "So, where have you been all day? I tried to keep a track of you, but you moved around a lot, and since you didn't seem to be in trouble, I didn't bother you."

Paige rolled her eyes, bringing her arm up and tracing a circular pattern in his chest with her index finger, "I really don't have the energy to explain it… Tomorrow…" She replied, her eyelids beginning to droop a little. "I feel like I haven't seen you at all lately… How was your day?" She asked quietly, shifting a little and settling into the space she had on the sofa. "Get me up to speed, apart from Annabelle being mauled… 'cause I just spent the last ten minutes healing all her cuts."

"Equally draining by the sound of yours…" He replied, staring at the ceiling as he recalled the events of the day. "Let's see… Piper finally mastered that damn bow… Brennan got into hot water with Phoebe because he wouldn't tell us where you were, which I'm still looking for the answer to… We tried to stop the tidal wave…" He was beginning to fall back asleep, "… And I missed you like hell… Paige?"

She had already fallen asleep.


	15. Thyme Of My Life

**Thyme Of My Life**

Night had fell on Golden Gate Park. A large empty area covered in grass glistened, thanks to the combination of the recently fallen rain and the dim moonlight that now shone brightly from the clear sky, as the rain clouds had evaporated almost under the heat of the summer sun earlier that day. The area however, didn't remain so empty and dark for long.

A column of bright blue and white lights were descending from the sky and gently falling towards the cement path that ran along next to the trees of the park. It hit the ground, instantly beginning to fade away and leaving three children in its place, all of them huddled together in a fearful cluster except the tallest of the trio, who seemed to be leading them.

"Wyatt, I don't think we should do this…" Chris whispered fearfully, gripping Lorna's hand tighter to make sure he didn't lose her in the dark. "Mom says that she's trying to find Dad, maybe we should just let her and Aunt Phoebe and Aunt Paige do stuff like this." He looked down through his thick brown hair, pouting a little at the fact that he was in the middle of a park in his pajamas.

Wyatt bit his lip and rolled his eyes, turning around to his little brother, "Chris, I thought you said you weren't going to wuss out on me this time! Mom's caught me the last two nights and I've been alone for it. If we're all together, there's less chance of us getting hurt, so there's less chance of us getting into trouble. As long as we stick together, we're fine."

Although he was a little young to understand his own feelings, Chris was a little resentful towards Wyatt for boggling his mind with a long winded explanation that probably only made sense in the eldest Halliwell-Wyatt's head. It wasn't that he wasn't smart. All three of them were extremely intelligent for their ages, but Chris and Lorna just weren't old enough to trump their big brother on this subject. "Alright…" The middle child replied quietly and reluctantly, before spotting something rummaging in a trash can next to a bench. "What's that?"

"Demon…" Lorna whimpered, also in her pajamas. Wyatt was the only one of them that was properly dressed for being outside, "Home… wanna go home…" She whispered, holding onto Chris' hand even tighter.

"Don't worry, Lorny." Wyatt said confidently, kneeling down to the two and a half year old's level and smiling warmly, "I'll protect you." He stood up to his full height again, frowning at the unknown being that seemed to be sifting through the trash. "It has to be Dad… I scryed for him."

The three of them moved slowly towards the being, staying in a tightly knit group. Partly out of unity, and partly out of fear. They shuffled along the path, Wyatt in sneakers, and the other two in slippers, slowly advancing on it and hoping with all their might that it was their father.

Their hopes were dashed when they came close enough to see what it was. Unbeknownst to the three children, it was the same creature that had mauled Annabelle in the Elemental Chamber. It looked up from the trash can, the remains of what looked like a tuna sandwich hanging from its long teeth, teeth that were so long it prevented it from closing its mouth properly.

The demon let out a low growl as it spotted the three children staring at it with wide eyes. It cocked its head a little, its beady black eyes dazzling in the moonlight before it went down on all fours, prowling along the ground and opening its mouth even wider, showing off its sickly grey tongue that was the same colour as its skin.

Wyatt frowned darkly. He had scryed for his father and it had landed on this location. He wasn't going to let a trash eating demon scare him off now. Putting his arms out protectively, he covered his younger siblings as they cowered behind him, waiting for their big brother to deploy his protection shield and orb them out, as Chris' powers were not yet strong enough to orb with passengers.

The blonde boy scrunched up his eyes, summoning his shield, only to realize that his efforts had been fruitless. His powers had never failed him in his entire life, why was this starting now? He jumped with surprise when Chris, clearly seeing that his brother's powers weren't working, threw out an arm in an attempt to repel the enemy with his telekinesis. Unfortunately, Chris only possessed the power make the creature stumble back a few steps, instead of sending it into the air like he had seen his aunt and older cousin do with so many demons before now.

As the children were too focused on the demon that was steadily advancing on them, they didn't notice when another column of orbs descended from the heavens on the other side of the clearing, depositing their Aunt Paige as it left. The witchlighter instantly looked around her surroundings and her face contorted into one of anger as she let a vicious curse fly from her mouth, "You can't do this! You can't just do that and then drop me in the middle of the damn park!" She bellowed towards the heavens, her left eye and nose twitching when all she got was silence, "Assholes!" She boomed in the sky's direction, shaking her head with disgust.

It was this outburst that alerted the children to her presence, "Aunt Paige! Help!" Chris shouted across the clearing, before throwing another weak telekinetic hit into the demon's chest, hurling it back a few feet.

The moment Paige turned around to see who had been calling her, her head hit her chest and she had reappeared within a ruby flare on the other side of the clearing, her astral protection standing between the demon and the children. Remembering that her powers didn't work in her astral form, she raised her leg, planting her heel in the creature's skull and making it elicit a roar of pain as it collapsed to the ground from its four legged position. "Oh, fu…" She was cut off as she suddenly vanished in the same red glow she had appeared.

Her real body came back to life, and Paige immediately began running across the large expanse of grass, forcing her will onto the demon and telekinetically flipping it into the air, causing it to land in the trash can, thrashing wildly as it struggled to get out, "Okay, Wyatt. Orb us out. Now!"

"Can't you do it?" He asked timidly, not trusting his own powers after his failure to summon his shield into existence.

Paige bit her lip, "… No. Just do it, please." She ordered, putting her hands firmly on Chris' shoulders and waiting for her eldest nephew to help them escape. With a little hesitation, Wyatt slowly vanished in a swirl of orbs that consumed the other three. When they were all devoured in orbs, the twinkling cloud shot towards the sky, transporting the four away from the park.

* * *

"I just _cannot_ believe you would try this again…" Piper growled to her eldest son as she violently folded up the map he had scryed with, doing it in such a passive aggressive manner that when the map refused to fold, she would just force it down and make a new fold, "I mean, is it not enough that you've got no TV and no video games for a fortnight from the last two times you went out like this? Do you want me to add a power ban to that? Because that's the way you're headed, mister!"

"How do you know it wasn't Chris' idea? Or Lorna's? She's really smart for a two year old!" Wyatt argued back, gesturing towards his two siblings, who were sitting uncomfortably on the couch with Paige while their big brother argued yet again with their mother.

"Well, first of all, you went out alone the past two nights, which already makes you look guilty. And second of all, you're the only one dressed, which makes me think that you basically dragged them out of bed to come with you." Piper shot back, angrily tying up her canary yellow dressing gown, "What were you thinking? Tonight is the perfect example. From what I hear, your Aunt Paige saved you from being seriously hurt!"

"I was thinking about getting Dad back, since you're doing nothing! All you care about is your restaurant and getting more money!" Wyatt spat, glaring at his mother with such rage that Piper was taken aback by such strong emotion from an eight year old.

"Wyatt, that is _not_ true, and you know it. I've been trying to get your Dad back, and I will get your Dad back, it's just going to take-,"

"Time." Wyatt finished her sentence, "I'm sick of hearing that! Dad's been gone for weeks and weeks and you've been doing nothing!" He suddenly picked up the map, ripping it into pieces and throwing it to the ground, "Just admit it. Scrying can't find him, we can't orb to him, we can't…" His bottom lip began to quiver as his eyes started to go red as they were on the verge of tears, "… We can't even use magic to find him…" He whispered lowly, looking at Piper with pure grief as tears gushed from his eyes and down his face, "I just want my Dad back!"

"Wyatt…" Piper breathed, on the verge of tears herself as she shakily called out to her son, "I'm sorry…" But it was too late; he had already vanished down the attic steps, the awkward silence suddenly broken by the loud noise of a door slamming on the floor below, causing Piper to scrunch her eyes, silently weeping into her hands.

"Um… Why don't you guys go back to bed? Off you go…" Paige crooned softly, gently coaxing the remaining children off the sofa and sending them to their rooms. The witchlighter got to her feet, moving towards her big sister and wrapping her arms around her neck, pulling her into a comforting hug and letting her weep on her shoulder.

After a few minutes, Piper managed to get her crying under control and pulled away from Paige's arms, giving her a sad smile, "Thanks for being my shoulder to cry on… literally." She joked, before wiping her eyes with the sleeve of her fluffy dressing gown, "Alright, what did this demon look like? I want to find it and kill it in the most violent way possible for coming after my kids."

"Um… actually, it sorta looked like the demon you said attacked Annabelle in the Elemental Chamber. Where's the picture Phoebe drew of it? I know it's all I have to go on, but I got a pretty good look at it back there." Paige said with a slight cringe, knowing that Piper probably wouldn't respond well to anything but good news.

Walking across to the Book of Shadows, Piper gripped the top of a piece of paper that was sticking out the top of the tome. She pulled at it sharply, nearly ripping it, before thrusting it into Paige's hand, showing her the rather accurate illustration Phoebe had did of the demon, "Yeah, that's him. Although its teeth are a little bigger."

Piper let out a raged filled sigh, biting down on her bottom lip before folding her arms over her chest, "Annabelle!" She barked sharply. Instantly, a loud whirring sound reach their hearing as a swarm of particles flew through the ceiling, land on the floor and forming Annabelle, "Paige just saw the demon you're after in Golden Gate Park. Find it and kill it."

"Right." The blonde replied, before frowning at Paige, "What the hell were you doing in the park at two a.m.?"

"Long story…" Paige groaned in reply, "It was rummaging around in a trash can. I think I stunned it, so it might still be there."

Annabelle looked at the back of Piper's head, feeling that she had been called during a rather tense situation, "Okay, thanks. I'll come back with its head on a platter." She said darkly, before vanishing in a swirl of molecules that shot through the minuscule cracks in the ceiling.

"It was like you were fighting with a teenager." Paige marveled cautiously, referring to the argument that had just taken place between her sister and her nephew, "Hey, at least you're raising him smart. And crafty."

"Don't forget stubborn. He has Leo's stubbornness and my pig-headedness, a lethal combination between two people, let alone with one person." Piper sighed, running a hand through her thick, long hair, "Maybe I should just get possessed by that Hindu God again. I mean, I could certainly use the extra arms, and having the Ultimate Mother around wouldn't hurt, seeing as how I'm failing so miserably in that department right now…"

Paige let out a hollow laugh, "Piper, you are anything _but_ a bad Mom. Seriously, you're like my role model." She said, smiling a little when her big sister's cheeks flushed with embarrassment, "Wyatt's just acting out a little right now, that's all. Leo vanishing again has probably made him pretty angry."

"Yeah, see, I should have realized that before tonight. I've been blind to their pain for the last three months! I mean, what part of me even thought that Wyatt, Chris, and Lorna would be okay with losing their Dad for the umpteenth time? Of course they're upset. They're angry, they don't understand… And why is all of this just slapping me in the face _now_?" She shrieked to herself, clenching her fists and resisting the urge to punch the table, "I've become one of those job-obsessed women that rely on the mercenary who lives in the basement to raise her kids."

"Yeah, because that's really the working mom stereotype…" Paige murmured sarcastically, "Don't you think you're being a little over dramatic?"

"No, really. Annabelle sees them more than I do, and she spends half her life in the Underworld!" Piper argued back instantly, cutting off a chance for Paige to try and console her.

"Piper, you've just been busy with the restaurant, and making sure that P3 stays afloat during its construction, not to mention the constant attempts at finding Leo, no matter what Wyatt says." Paige folded her arms, giving her sister a sympathetic stare, "Here's what you need to do. Tomorrow, instead of leaving them with Annabelle, spend the entire day with them, and, you know, maybe try and help them understand what's going on with Leo. Kids love to feel equal and included."

Piper's eyes widened in mock rage as let out one worse boom of laughter, "Oh! You _so_ did not just lay some social worker psychology on me." She chuckled, "I would love to do that, but the restaurant opens tomorrow night, and-,"

"-You've got an insanely overpaid manager to take care of everything for you. All you need to do is show up in the evening, cut the tape or whatever, and look pretty. And hey, you've already got one of those things down." Paige smiled, hitting Piper affectionately on the arm. "If worse comes to worst, I can be there in a flash. You just have some overdue fun with your kids."

The eldest Charmed One calmly put her hand on the table, using it to balance as she mulled the suggestion over in her head before caving, "Oh, hell. Fine, I'll do it. But remember, if you have to go to the restaurant and you can't handle it, you call me! I can't have anything going wrong tomorrow. I've got food critics from all over the Bay Area coming."

"Deal!" Paige beamed, wiggling her eyebrows, "You, my dear, will not regret this."

"I'd better not…" She said lowly, before a silence passed over the two of them, "Um… Isn't this the past where you usually orb out?" Piper said uncomfortably, wanting to go back to bed and get some rest.

"Oh… I just want to have a look at the book for a second. You go to bed and get some rest; you'll need it for tomorrow." Paige said with a grin that Piper found unnerving, before she turned on her heel and headed for the attic stairs, going back to her room. Once Paige was certain her sister was out of earshot, she looked heavenward and called as quietly as she could, "Aidan!"

Almost instantly, a puddle of water formed on the floor, the figure of a human rising from its seemingly endless depths and forming her husband, "Are you okay? What did they do?" Aidan asked urgently, moving towards his wife and placing his hands protectively on her waist, checking for injuries in the process as he had been waiting up for her return all night.

"Wow, you actually stayed awake this time. You're getting better." She smirked, before her face took on a serious expression, "It was horrible. Not to mention tiring. Long story short, they took away my whitelighter powers after a five hour debate. Bastards…"

Aidan shook his head, obviously just as furious as Paige was, "I can't believe this… All because you healed a mortal wound that hadn't been inflicted by a demon? They didn't even give you your powers. What gives them the right to take them away?"

Paige rolled her eyes, before wearily resting her head on his chest, "You basically just summed up the last five hours of my life with those few sentences. C'mon, let's go home. I think I'll collapse if I'm awake much longer."

"Alright. Hey… Why are you here in the first place?" Aidan frowned, suddenly realizing where they actually were.

"Long story." The witch droned back, not really in the mood for relaying all the details of Piper's problems with her children at this moment in time. "Just splash already." She let out a tired groan after she had spoken, "I miss being able to orb already…"

* * *

Pamela scuttled from the hallway in a hurried fashion, heading towards the kitchen as she fumbled with an earring that she was trying to attach to her right ear, "God, I am so late!" She exclaimed to Jordann and McKenzie, who were both lounging around on the sofas in the living room, watching the morning news, "Why the hell didn't you guys wake me up? I told you I wanted to have time to do a little last minute cramming before my final!"

"Because the last time I woke you up, you TKed me across the room. I still have the bruise on my ass to prove it!" Jordann spat, not even turning her head away from the TV, "Look, just think about this. After this final, you're done for the summer. You've spent the last two months studying for everything, and I don't think that psychology is going to be the one to beat you down. From what I understand, most of its just common sense."

"If that's what you think, then you really _don't_ understand." Pamela snapped, letting out a small laugh of triumph as she finally got her earring in, "By the way, Keith's coming over. He's gonna wait here for me, I'm gonna have lunch with him, and then I was thinking the three of us could do something. I need to seriously unwind." She informed the two of them.

"Okay." McKenzie replied with a mouthful of cereal in her mouth, "I guess I should get something new to wear if we're going out tonight for drinks. Oh, and I need to collect a package, as it was sent back to the postal depot because _someone_ couldn't get up to answer the door and sign for it!" She said, shooting a glare towards Jordann as she did.

The feral rolled her eyes, "Oh, please, Miss eBay-aholic. You have packages coming in everyday, is it so bad that I miss one?"

"Um… actually, a little change of plans. We're not going out on the town tonight; we're going to a restaurant opening." Pamela told them, before she gulped down most of the coffee in her mug, choking on its heat for a few seconds and spluttering loudly, "Where the hell are the bagels?" She asked hurriedly, slamming the cupboard shut when she realized there were none where they usually kept them.

"We're out." Jordann replied, "A restaurant opening, huh? Cool. How did you manage to score three invites to something like that? I hear they're usually reserved for the high class and food critics."

"Four." Pamela corrected, "Keith's coming with us. And it helps to have the owner for an aunt. We're basically to go and praise her food to high heaven. Don't worry, she's good, so it'll probably be sincere. Except that we'll be having dinner at eleven o'clock on our time, so if you guys maybe want get a quick bite around eight, that's fine."

"Nah, I'll save myself." McKenzie answered, before receiving confused looks from her roommates, as she was the one who appreciated food the most, "Well, we're going to a restaurant opening, I want to be able to eat as much of this fabulous food as I can without getting full, not to mention having two dinners would probably leave me feeling bloated."

"Good point. I'll save my hunger too." Jordann said, turning to Pamela, "So I guess that just leaves you and Keith… having dinner." A smile spread across her face as the Halliwell witch glared in her direction.

"I guess so. And don't get any ideas, alright? We're still that stage where we don't know if things are serious." Pamela replied, "Okay, I'm ready to go! Lucky pen? Check. Brain? Check… alright, I'm good to go. See you guys in a couple of hours. Keith should be here…" She opened the door, only to find the mutant in question in the hallway, his fist raised in the air as he was about to knock, "… Now." Pamela finished her sentence, "Hey."

"Hey," He grinned, leaning down slightly and kissing her lightly on the lips, "Is it still alright that I stick around here? I don't want to intrude on Jordann and Mac." He said, looking past Pamela to look at the two women sitting on the couches.

"It's fine. Although I won't be responsible for Jordann's actions if you spy on her when she's coming out the shower." Pamela said with a smirk, turning around to her friend, who nodded darkly in return. She raised her arm to look at her watch, her eyes widening when she saw the time, "Aw, crap! I gotta go! I'll see you later." She said in a rushed tone, giving him a quick peck on the lips as she rushed out of the apartment, "I love you." She called out casually from the hallway, leaving the rest of them in shock at the three words that had just come from the witch's mouth.

McKenzie let out a snort of laughter as she took another spoonful of cereal, "So much for having her brain…"

* * *

Phoebe's face continued to fall as Paige relayed the news of Wyatt's midnight wanderings over the phone. She let out a sigh, pressing her free hand to her forehead, feeling the beginning to a migraine coming on. She wanted to go to sleep, but trying to find something both stylish and wearable for a seven month pregnant woman to wear to the opening tonight of a restaurant was becoming a real task, "Oh my God…" The middle Charmed One groaned sorrowfully down the receiver, "I can't believe we never noticed how badly she's been coping. We're really crappy sisters, you know."

"In our defense…" Paige began as she leant back in her chair, putting her feet up on the desk and twirling the chord around her index finger as she looked out to the building opposite of her work, "… I don't think even Piper noticed how badly she's been coping. Let's face it; she's given us no reason to worry. She's been scarily stoic by her standards, and Leo disappearing is a pretty common event, so why shouldn't we have expected her to deal with it like the last few times?"

"Because it's different this time, that's why." Phoebe replied, glowering darkly as she held up another maternity blouse that she refused to wear outside the house, shaking her head in her reflection in the mirror and throwing the item to the bed, "Look, before we started seeing ghostly apparitions, and before Annabelle was possessed, she was convinced that Leo was dead…"

"You're not saying what I think you're saying, are you? Phoebe, he's alive. He has to be."

"All I'm saying is that maybe Leo was just asking Piper to help him move on when he possessed Annabelle. He never did go into specifics as far as we know, so maybe after three months, he's managed to move on himself…" Phoebe said sadly, looking down at her stomach, as it was now blocking the view to her feet, "I'm not saying we shouldn't stop looking for him, but the trail's led nowhere, and from the sounds of it, even the kids are losing hope."

"All the more reason we need to stay positive and work even harder." Paige argued back, taking her feet off the desk and falling back into a normal position, leaning back in her chair, "Maybe you could do some book duty seeing as how you're not really doing anything for the next two months?" She didn't get an answer; all she heard was a few clicking noises, followed by a creak, "Pheebs? You there?"

"Yeah, sorry, I was just opening the window. I swear, between the summer heat and these hot flashes I've been getting, I'll be a puddle before this baby is born." She sighed, sitting down on her bed and bathing in the cool wind that was now blowing into her bedroom, "And in response to your question, I'll do what I can, but right now, I just want to sleep. I have a migraine coming on, and I still don't have a damn outfit for tonight… Hey, the restaurant has air conditioning, right? Because I'll die if it doesn't."

"Relax, it does." Paige cringed as she thought about all the symptoms her older sister was experiencing, "It sounds like you're having the third trimester from Hell."

"Yeah, it really wouldn't surprise me if all these ailments were demonically char- AH!"

"Phoebe?" Paige spring forward from her laid back position, listening intently to what was on the other line, hearing nothing, just an odd crackle when the wind would hit the receiver on her sister's end.

Phoebe slowly lowered the phone to the bed and stared fearfully at the demon that had just flown in her window. She immediately recognized its appearance and psychic thought pattern to be the same demon from the Elemental Chamber. It sat calmly on the floor, not moving an inch, even when Phoebe summoned a threatening psionic blast above her eyes. The two of them stared each other out, all the while the middle Charmed One's powers probed its mind, "What the hell…?" She whispered, cocking her head slightly and diffused the glowing globe of mental energy as the creature imitated her movement. It wasn't attacking her, and she couldn't sense any malevolence from it, what was going on?

Her thoughts were broken when a column of red light suddenly burst into existence, flaring outwards and leaving Paige's astral projection standing in its place. The witchlighter instantly shook her head in disgust, "You just don't learn, do you?" She spat, raising her leg with the intention to bring her heel down hard on its head.

"No! Paige, don't!" Phoebe suddenly shouted, grabbing onto her sister's wrist and stopping her from finishing her move, "Don't attack it. It's not going to hurt us." She said calmly, her forehead beginning to glow with a pale orange light as she opened a telepathic link with the creature.

The link was severed however, when a cloud of particles flew through the window, quickly forming Annabelle, who looked like she had been up all night, and with dark circles around her eyes and her flustered appearance, it was clear that she had. Instantly, she flicked her wrist out towards the demon, an energy ball crackling to life and flying from her palm immediately, only for it to make part of the carpet burst into flames as the creature took flight once again, barreling for the window and vanishing.

"Damnit!" Annabelle cursed, stomping her foot and clenching her fists, before turning to Paige, "I saw you hesitate while I was coming towards the window. Why did you not give the son of a bitch a faceful of your shoe?"

"I…" Paige trailed off, frowning as she looked around, "I'm hearing voices…" She murmured, looking towards the ceiling.

"I always said you were crazy." Phoebe said with a smirk, before wincing in pain as she brought her hand up to her head.

"Funny…" The witchlighter sneered in response, before concentrating on whatever she could hear. Her eyes widened with realization as she grimaced at her new knowledge, "Aw, crap… it's my assistant. She probably thinks I've passed out on my desk. I gotta go before she calls an ambulance. Later!" She gave a small wave to the two women, before vanishing in a flare of crimson light.

Annabelle let out a sigh of frustration as her explanation vanished along with Paige. Hoping to get an answer out of the middle Charmed One, she turned to the side and raised her eyebrows in a questioning manner, shrugging, "Well? What happened?"

Phoebe groaned, pressing the points where her eyes met her nose, "Well, don't look at me…" She said wearily, flopping back on the bed and shifting into a comfortable lying position with her back to the mercenary, "I have a migraine!"

* * *

Piper grinned as she pressed her finger down on the button on the camera. A flash went off, capturing a picture of Lorna getting her face painted by a clown that had a scary resemblance to Paige's old doll, Slappy. The redhead turned to the camera, grinning inanely and showing off the large purple shooting star that had been painted onto her right cheek. "Yeah, you're a star!" Piper said, her grin becoming impossibly bigger as she took another snapshot.

"Okay!" The clown suddenly boomed, clapping his hands together, "Since you were such a good girl and sat nicely while I was painting, I'm gonna give you…" He made some emphatic gestures with his hands, before a deep red lollipop seamlessly appeared in his hand, making the children and parents in the queue laugh and clap at this display, "Here you go." He said brightly, handing Lorna the lollipop.

"Wow! That was magic!" Piper said, sharing a small smirk with her surrogate daughter, who grinned mischievously as she scooted off the silver stool to make way for the next child. Piper held out her hand, gripping onto Lorna's tightly when the toddler put her hand in hers. The last thing she wanted was to lose Lorna in a crowded carnival.

"Can I have dis now?" Lorna asked, shaking the lollipop in her hand and smiling up at Piper with an innocence that always made the eldest Charmed One fold.

"What's the magic word?"

"Pleeeease?"

Piper smiled, "Well, alright then. You need help unwra-?" She cut herself when Lorna had already torn off the plastic cover to the top of the lollipop, and threw the cover into a trash can that they had passed, "You are an amazing little girl, do you know that?" She said affectionately, stroking her red hair lovingly, "Your Dad is going to be so proud of how you've handled everything."

"He coming back?" Lorna suddenly asked; hope shining in her eyes at the very mention of Leo returning to them.

With a sigh, Piper leaned down and hoisted the toddler up onto her hip, realizing that this was becoming quite an impossible feat, thanks to her own less than average height and Lorna's getting bigger by the day, "Yes, he's coming back… but I want you to know that it's going to take some time. It's not going to happen overnight, but it will happen… Do you believe me?"

The redhead seemed to think it over for a few seconds, before nodding silently and leaning into Piper's chest, wrapping her small arms around the eldest Charmed One's neck, "I miss him…" She whispered sadly into Piper's ear, sticking her lollipop into her mouth as she did.

"I know you do, honey…" Piper replied softly, putting her free arm around Lorna and cuddling her in a motherly fashion, "I do too…"

"Hey, Mom!" Wyatt called out to his mother as he and Chris made it through the busy crowd, Chris with a cardboard carrier in his hands. It had four slots, each of them filled with ice cream cones.

"We got change." The Chris announced, shoving his hand into his pocket as Piper lowered Lorna back to the ground as he handed over a five dollar bill.

"Thanks, you two." She said, taking a lick of her ice cream cone before noticing that Lorna was trying to eat her ice cream and her lollipop at the same time, "Nuh huh, little miss. You're gonna have to choose between the two, I don't want you hyped up on tons of sugar for the rest of the day."

Pouting, Lorna turned on her heel and cautiously walked the few steps towards the trash can, throwing the lollipop in, and walking back to her family, taking a large lick from her ice cream, "Dis is better…" She said contentedly, taking another lick from the ice cream, which was already beginning to drip down her hand.

"Okay, so, what's the plan?" Piper asked, looking down at her two boys, "Wyatt, I want you to wait at least half an hour before going anywhere near that rollercoaster, so why don't we go to that shooting gallery Chris wanted to try out near the entrance?" She suggested, seeing each of her children nod in agreement with her plan.

"Mom, is this supposed to be some weird punishment?" Wyatt asked, giving his mother a suspicious eye as he slowly ate his ice cream, "I thought you'd bind my powers…" He said quietly, clearly feeling guilty about the night before now that he had had time to think about what he had done.

"No, this isn't a punishment. C'mon, let's go sit down over here. I want to talk to you guys about something." Piper suddenly announced, leading the three children over to an empty bench where they all sat down, Piper sitting at the end so she could look at all of them properly, "I want you all to know that your Dad is so brave. He risked his life to save me, and I'm going to find him, bring him home, and we'll go back to being a proper family." She looked down, trying to find the right words to explain, "But… I need you guys to believe in me, and stay strong… because it's when you guys start to lose hope that I start to lose hope. So please, will you just lay off the whole sneaking out at night thing? It just makes me worry even more."

Lorna was the first to respond, standing up on the bench and hugging Piper tightly. She hadn't properly understood all of the witch's speech, but she knew the general message that she had been trying to send. She nestled her face into Piper's hair, liking the scent of whatever shampoo she had used that morning.

Chris and Wyatt exchanged a look with one another, before silently sliding off the bench and hugging their mother, "I'm sorry, Mom…" Wyatt whispered as Piper put her arm around her two boys, "I'll stay in bed at night from now on. Promise…"

"I know sweetie…" She murmured, her eyes beginning to redden with tears, "I'm sorry too… I love you guys so much. I'd rather chew off my own arm than have you hurt." Piper was about to continue, before she felt a cold sensation that was running down her back, "What the…?"

Without even realizing it, Lorna had let her ice cream cone drip down Piper's neck.

* * *

Pamela burst through her apartment door, quickly scanning the living area and sighing, "Did he leave?" She asked McKenzie quietly, as the mutant was sitting at the kitchen counter, reading over the newspaper and doing the crossword.

She looked up from her current project, moving a lock of black hair from her eyes in the process, "Yeah… He shot outta here like a bat outta Hell about ten minutes after you left. He looked pretty freaked… I can't blame the guy for, you know, acting like a typical guy." She bit her lip at Pamela's flustered appearance, "When did you finally realize what you said?"

"About halfway through my final. I almost got kicked out because I shouted a certain word at the top of my voice." Pamela replied, taking her bag off her shoulder and hurling it to the couch, "Damnit! I've totally screwed this up, haven't I?" She shoved her hand into her pocket, bringing out her cellphone, "Did he say if he was still coming to the opening tonight?"

"He didn't say anything, he just left." McKenzie explained as Pamela held the phone to her ear after dialing his number, "Look, I don't get what the big deal is. You were honest with your feelings, and if he can't handle that, screw him." She frowned when it seemed Pamela was more focused on losing it than listening to her, "Pam, honey, you gotta keep it together, don't let it do this to you."

"Voicemail…" She growled, flipping her phone shut and walking into the kitchen, putting her elbows down on the table and burying her face into her hands, letting out a small scream of anger, "Why? Why did I have to go and do this? Things have been going great lately. I have a great apartment, great friends, great boyfriend, demonic activity's been light, and you also turned out to be great after me playing many horrible scenarios in my head about what the new roommate would be like-,"

"Aw, thanks."

"You're welcome." Pamela quickly replied, not stopping her rant, "And then I have to go and screw it up with… feelings!" She let her head drop to the counter, hitting it with a resounding thud.

"Look, it's not over until the fat lady sings." McKenzie began, "For all you know, you've just voiced Keith's feelings and he's just a little scared about the whole thing." She shook her head in disbelieve, "Man, I have never seen a woman crash like this at the mention of love. What's got you wound so tight?"

Pamela got up from her slouched position over the counter, her voice suddenly going quiet, "It's nothing. Never mind." She murmured, walking away to pick up her bag, before heading down the hallway to her room, "Where's Jordann?"

"She went across the street to get milk. She said she'd be back in a-," McKenzie was cut off by a door slamming viciously at the other end of the hallway, "… second." She finished, letting out a confused sigh before going back to the newspaper.

As if on command, Jordann came through the door, holding a plastic bag that carried a carton of milk and a few other groceries. "Hey, I saw Pam walk into the building when I was in the store. Is she okay?" She asked, a cringe already set on her face, ready for any response McKenzie was about to give her.

"No, I don't think so." She replied in a frustrated tone, "Hey, she clamped up when I asked her why she's so cold when it comes to love. Do you have any idea why? You have known her for a lot longer after all."

The feral instantly stopped unloading the bag, turning around to face McKenzie while putting her hands on the counter, leaning on it. "Her high school boyfriend… I think he left a lot more damage than Pam either realizes, or doesn't want to admit to."

"What happened?"

Jordann walked over the breakfast bar, folding her arms, "Well, from what I can gather, they had a great relationship. They were friends first, which made a great foundation. And trust me, they needed it. His brother was a complete psycho by the sound of things; Pam should have dumped the guy's sorry ass… Anyway, they had agreed to a mutual separation after graduation, then, all of a sudden, on the eve of a big battle that Pam didn't really describe to me, he just suddenly turns around, breaks up with her, and walks out of her life."

McKenzie's eyes narrowed in disgust, "My God, what a complete asshole." She seethed, "But she can't let one bad experience ruin everything she has with Keith. I've seen them together; they're perfect for one another."

Jordann let out a sigh, turning around and going back to unloading the grocery bag, "Look, Mac, I'm gonna give you some advice that will hopefully stick with you for the rest of your days. Don't meddle with Pam's issues. The girl has been put through the wringer where life is concerned. You're better just standing back and offering support when she falls. If you take it any further, you'll lose her friendship, and her trust."

McKenzie's face took on a hard expression, one that was a mixture of anger and confusion. She tapped the counter with her index finger for a few seconds, before darting towards the door, grabbing her light sweater from the couch as she shot off the stool. "I'm going out." She announced stonily, flicking her hair out from the collar of the sweater and heading for the door.

"Where are you going?" Jordann called out weakly as she looked out from behind the refrigerator door.

"To meddle."

* * *

Piper nervously fixed her hair in the foyer mirror, pushing it behind her left ear and taking in a deep breath. She held out her hand, smiling wryly as it shook a little. She remembered feeling like this on the opening night of P3, but back then, she had had her sisters just down the hall, ready to calm her fears the moment they saw any signs of anxiety. Now, she was alone, with no real loved ones around her that were old enough to give her the assurance she needed. Everything had changed so much.

Realizing it was now or never, she took a hand down her simple black dress, smoothing out any bumps that had been caused by her body movements before looking down at the small table that held a picture of her, Leo, and the kids. She raised two fingers to her mouth, pressing them against her lips then bringing them down to the picture, putting them over Leo's face. "Wish me luck, honey…" she whispered lovingly, before walking towards the foot of the staircase, "Okay, you guys, I'm leaving!" She shouted up the stairs.

The thundering sound of three sets of footsteps hit her hearing as her children raced down the steps, each of them standing on a different step. "So, how does your Mom clean up?" Piper smirked, doing a quick twirl with her black cardigan draped over her arm for the time being.

"You look so pwetty!" Lorna breathed, walking down a few steps to play with one of the curls that Piper had styled her hair into.

"Yeah, you look great, Mom!" Chris enthused, smiling fondly as he knew that restaurant's construction had been extremely stressful for his mother, and the fact that she had managed to bring it to fruition without her husband around was even more of an accomplishment.

"Thanks! Okay, you, little miss, in bed in an hour. Chris, you've got one hour after that, and Wyatt, an hour after that. Annabelle's in the basement if there's any trouble, and no sweets. If you're hungry, have a slice of toast or a bowl of cereal." Piper quickly relayed to the three of them, knowing that they all already knew these rules, but it was just out of force of habit to do this every time she went out at night. "Good night…" She murmured warmly, moving from child to child, planting a kiss on their cheeks. "I'll see you in the morning. I'll probably be out till late."

Wyatt bit his lip, quickly glancing over his shoulder as Chris and Lorna made their way back up the stairs. "Hey, Mom, wait up!" He called out just before Piper went out the door, jumping down the few steps that were in front of him and making his way towards his mother, "Can I talk to you about something?"

Piper cringed a little, "Um… honey… Can it wait until tomorrow? I just need to get going." She sighed when she got a look to the floor for a reply. Stepping back into the house, she closed the door and bent down a little, careful not to go down onto her knees in her new dress, "But if it's that important, I can stay for a few minutes…"

The eldest Halliwell-Wyatt child opened his mouth, ready to share his current problem with his mother. The fact that most of his powers seemed to have vanished. "I…" He began, before smiling, "Never mind… It can wait till the morning."

"Alright." Piper smiled, heading back to the door, "Good night, sweetie." She crooned sweetly before leaving, the door closing with its usual creak and leaving only the sound of her heels clicking off the outside steps as any trace of her presence.

* * *

"So…" Aidan began as he and Paige walked away from the car, heading down the street with their arms linked while the valet took their vehicle around the back to the parking lot, "… are you gonna tell your sisters about the Elders taking away your whitelighter powers?" He asked, noticing his wife visibly shudder at the mention of the whole thing.

"Nah." Paige replied, shaking her head, "They've both got so much going on their lives right now, I don't want to worry them. If I can just get past Phoebe's pregnancy and the restaurant's shaky first month without being put into a situation where I have to orb, I'll be fine. I'm not gonna say a word to Pam either, seeing as how it was me healing her grandfather that got my powers taken in the first place… those bastards," She growled, sneering a little at the thought, "Anyway, let's just forget about that for now. Tonight, we're just two people going to a restaurant opening."

"Okay," Aidan agreed, running a hand down her bare arm before seeing the controlled yet crowded entrance to Piper's new project, "So, do you actually have any idea about what Piper what going to call this place? She's been pretty tight lipped about it."

Paige shrugged, "You know as much as I do, but she did say that we'd probably laugh the first time we saw…" She trailed off into a small chuckle when they reached the front, looking up to the restaurant's name that was emblazoned in gold metal that had been secured into a piece of black marble above the glass doors.

In bold letters, with a dot between each character, it read, "T.H.Y.M.E." In a more calming silver, twelve metallic dashes surrounded the name in a circular pattern, obviously meant to symbolize a clock or any other time piece.

Paige was about to comment when she heard a laugh similar to her own on her right. She looked over, smiling when she saw that Phoebe had had the same reaction she had. Noticing her younger sister, she tapped Brennan on the shoulder, before dragging him by the hand towards Paige, "Well, no one never said that Piper was the queen of subtlety…" Phoebe smirked, seeing that inspiration for the name had come from Piper's very first power as a witch.

* * *

"Uh, are you guys going to eat anything? Or just take advantage of the free bar?" Piper hissed at Pamela and Jordann, who had been standing at the bar for the last half hour, sipping at drinks slowly, "Because the last thing I need is two drunken college students on my opening night." She said, her tension beginning to show before she looked out to the busy restaurant, "Okay, good, I see no green faces…" She murmured to herself, before turning back to her niece, "Well?"

"Piper, relax. First of all, we're on our first drink. We've been wearing these down slowly because we're waiting for someone. When she arrives, we'll have something to eat and make out to the food critics like you're the god of restaurant owners. Trust me, things are going fine, and will continue to do so, as long as you calm down and make nice." Pamela said, taking another sip of her cocktail as Piper walked away, clearly only having time to give a quick warning. "Okay, so how many have you really had?"

"Two." Jordann replied smugly, "This is my third, but these cocktails are more soda than alcohol, so I'm good." She explained, spinning an olive in her drink before taking it out and eating it. "I am getting a little hungry though. Let's not forget that we're both on New York time, so we're verging on midnight without an evening meal."

"I know. What is keeping Mac? I gave her a portal potion earlier and she would have called if there was a problem. Did she even say where she was going?" Pamela asked, frowning when Jordann raised her glass to her lips, nearly burying her face in it. "You know something. Spill."

"What? I don't know… Oh, God." She looked past Pamela towards the entrance, laying her hand on her forehead and putting her elbow onto the bar, holding her head up and letting out a groan "I had nothing to do with this, I swear."

"Nothing to do with what?" Pamela asked, looking over her shoulder and instantly gasping with shock as she spotted McKenzie walking in through the entrance, with Keith by her side. Both of them looked nervous, and then petrified when Pamela spotted them, "What the hell is she playing at?"

"Hey!" McKenzie greeted the two of them brightly, "Will we go to our seats now?"

"You, come with me." Jordan said darkly, sliding off her barstool and grabbing McKenzie roughly by the wrist, dragging her away from the bar and towards the outside garden area that lay out the back.

"So, tell me the truth…" Pamela began, taking a swig from her glass as Keith took a seat where Jordann had been sitting a few moments ago. "… where you even going to show up tonight if Mac hadn't brought you here? Hell, would you have even showed up in my life ever again?"

Keith shook his head, taking in a deep breath, "Look, I freaked out, I don't deny it. I just… wasn't expecting it. Hell, I don't even think you were expecting it." He smirked, but that instantly vanished at Pamela's stony expression, "It's just not something that's been said to me a lot in my life. It caught me off guard."

"Are you trying to tell me that no one in your life has ever loved you? I find that hard to believe, especially when you have a father and an older brother."

"Yeah, I know, but they are probably the two most emotionally detached people I have ever met…" He rubbed his forehead a little, appearing to be struggling to find the right words, "… Can you imagine living in a house where your only two family members resent you for killing the person that meant everything to them?"

"Your mother…?" Pamela asked warily, remembering that Keith's mother had died giving birth to him.

"Yeah… My Dad was never the same after it. All of a sudden, he's lost his wife, and has a new screaming baby to take care of. My brother was five, so he never properly understood… Let's just say childhood wasn't exactly the most emotionally reassuring time for me…" He looked down, fidgeting with his hands, "But that was a long time ago… and I'm not about to let that ruin what I have now."

"What… are you saying?"

Wordlessly, Keith slid forward a little on his stool, putting a hand on her knee before leaning in and kissing her deeply, taking her hand as she let it drop from her drink and pulling her closer, intensifying the lip lock. They separated, and Keith flashed her a smile, stroking her cheek. "I love you…"

Jordann and McKenzie watched from the patio as Pamela leaned in for another kiss, "I can't believe you managed to pull this off." Jordann gaped, shaking her head in disbelieve as her friend smiled at the sight. "Do you even realize the massive risk you took in doing something like that?"

"Oh, be quiet, or I won't help you out when you need my help." McKenzie smirked, clinking her glass of champagne with Jordann's cocktail, "To meddling."

* * *

Phoebe took in a deep breath as she gently gripped the metal railing that ran along the edge of the patio. She closed her eyes and took in a deep breath, feeling the night air cool her down and comfort her from another hot flash. Reluctantly, she opened her eyes, looking out into the beautiful plants and foliage that had been planted in the outside area of the restaurant, smiling at how her sister had left no detail out.

Within the tall, thick plants, a glimmer caught her eye and made her heart jump. Phoebe looked back into the now empty restaurant, seeing that the light coming from the establishment had reflected off something in the plants, and that something was moving. She slowly moved along the edge of the patio until she bumped into a chair, "Hello…?" Phoebe called out shakily.

"You talking to someone?"

The middle Charmed One flinched with fright as she turned around, only to be greeted with the concerned face of her husband, "Uh… nope, I didn't say anything. You must have been hearing things."

"Oh…. Okay." Brennan said, narrowing his eyes at his wife before casting them over the clump of plants that she had seemed to be watching intently.

"Hey!" Paige greeted as she entered with Aidan, "I had a feeling I'd find you out here." She smirked at her sister as Aidan wrapped his arms around her waist from behind, "Air conditioning just not cutting it, huh?" The witchlighter questioned her with a wink, knowing that Phoebe had been suffering the most from the summer heat.

She smiled in return, taking Brennan's hand and leaning on his side as he put an arm around her shoulders, "Yeah, you can't beat good old fashioned fresh air when it comes to getting a cool down." She looked up to her husband's face, giving him a pleading look, "Although we can still keep the fan on in our room tonight, can't we?" She asked.

"Anything to make you more comfortable." He said, kissing the top of her head.

"Aw, now you see, I should have had support like that when I was pregnant, mister!" Paige said with a tone that was between hurt and mock, elbowing Aidan lightly in the ribs from where he was standing. "What did I have? A dog. Yeah, all I had was a dog."

"Here we go again…" Aidan groaned, before looking towards Brennan with a grin, "You always have a way of making me look bad, don't you?" He chuckled, giving Paige a delicate squeeze around her mid-section as she lay back against his chest.

"Ah, it's the price I pay for being so great, isn't it, honey?" Brennan grinned, looking down at Phoebe for confirmation.

"Oh, I don't know about _so_ great, but yeah, you're pretty great, I guess." She smirked, before suddenly moving away from him and backing up against the railing, "Ugh, hot flash! No!" She suddenly barked when Brennan moved towards her, "The last thing I need is someone else's body heat!"

"Okay, I just spent the last ten minutes congratulating my staff for a job well done tonight, so now I need an ego boost." Piper announced, walking down the small set of steps that led out into the patio. She looked behind her, watching as a few bus boys mopped the floor, "No, seriously, I want your honest opinions…"

Phoebe and Paige shared a dark and nervous look, looking toward Piper with regretful eyes, before grinning inanely and laughing, "This place is amazing, Piper!" Phoebe exclaimed, moving towards her big sister and giving her hug, ignoring the protests from Brennan about what she had just said about body heat.

"Yeah, I will definitely be dining here from now on… as long as we get discounts." Paige joked, also moving over to Piper and putting an arm around her shoulders as Phoebe hugging her, "Leo's gonna be so proud when he comes back…" She whispered, getting a sad nod from Piper.

"Well, speaking of time…" Aidan began, "… we should probably get home. We said to the Elvin nanny that we'd be home half an hour ago, and her overtime rates are unbelievable, so… Paige?" He gently urged, putting an arm around his wife's waist and slowly pulling her away, "Congrats on all this, Piper!" He called as the two walked off to the front exit of the restaurant.

"Thank you! Good night!" She called back, before turning to Phoebe and Brennan, "So, you guys heading off too?"

"Yeah, Lexa isn't the best person when it comes to children, so we should probably get back so we can still get enough sleep after hearing her rant about how hard it is to put Connor to bed." Phoebe laughed a little. In any other person, she'd find such a thing an insult, but with Lexa, it was just a quirk to her personality, "Good night, sweetie," She said warmly, squeezing Piper's hand as she passed her on her way out.

"Night…" She weakly called back, not even bothering to turn around and watch the couple leave. Taking the first calm breath she had all evening, Piper took a few steps out towards the patio and sat down at one of the many tables, just taking in the success she thought the evening had been. She wished with all her heart that Leo was sitting on the other side of the table, softly praising her for her efforts this evening, but she knew the only thing she would get tonight was silence.

Standing up, she straightened out her dress once again, knowing that the reviews from the various food critics would be hitting the papers at the weekend. Piper smiled wryly, and, in a surprising burst of self confidence, knew that they would be fantastic. She climbed the set of steps, turning around to face the garden with a soft gaze.

"Good night…"

* * *


	16. Matthews Family Values

Edited because of the shameful mistake Princess Pinky pointed out. I must have confused her with the Aunt Jackie from Season 1. Aviva ruins _everything_!

**Matthews Family Values**

Paige quietly seethed to herself as she unzipped her suitcase, the top almost flying off from the pressure it had been under to keep the severely over packed suitcase from flying open. She stood up straight, moving her hair back behind her ears and placing her hands on her hips. The witchlighter started to think that there wasn't even any point in unpacking her things, as they were only here for a weekend, and that maybe Aidan had been right when he had said she had packed too much stuff.

The man in question arrived in the room, letting out a groan of anguish and hitting his head of the oak doorframe, "The next time one of these things rolls around the corner, I'll stay home and look after the kids." He stated, moving towards the bed and flopping down onto it.

"That bad, huh?" Paige smirked, knowing full well that having to meet her full family for the first time has probably a trial for the elemental.

"I just had to dodge your grandmother in the elevator. She said she was going to put a hex on me for ever leaving you in the first place…" Fear suddenly hit him as his head shot up from the bed, "Hey, no one in this family _is_ actually magical, right…?" He asked warily, his face falling when all he got from Paige was a coy smile.

"Well, now that I think about it, there was his one guy in college who cheated on me. I told my grandmother, and I never saw him again… Not on campus or anywhere, maybe she did something to him." She smirked, beginning to delicately transfer her clothes from her suitcase to the large closet in their room, "Where are the kids?"

Aidan nodded towards the door, "Down the hall. Your aunt and uncle are with them. I could have sworn I saw candy and cash switch hands, so I'm pretty sure Mel and Emma will love them for the rest of the weekend." He said, before jumping at the loudness of Paige's Aunt Julie making an entrance.

"Paigey!" The woman boomed jovially, holding one arm out in the air while the other leaned on her crutch, "Come here and give your Aunty a hug!" She ordered with a large grin. At first, it took Paige's eyes a few moments to adjust to the brightness of her aunt's pink poncho, especially when it was contrasted with her dark jeans; it took her even less time to melt at Julie's beaming smile.

"Hey!" Paige greeted her happily, hugging her aunt tightly before noticing the crutch and frowning darkly, "What's with the crutch? Was the hip operation a bust?" She asked with concern.

"Oh, this old thing?" Julie looked down at the crutch before laughing, "Don't worry, honey. It was a complete success; I've just got to carry this thing around until it's had time to heal properly. You watch me, next family reunion; I'll be pummeling those so called men into the ground at the football game!"

"Oh, okay, where's Uncle Dave?"

"He's down the hall doting on those kids of yours. Dave!" She bellowed down the hallway, causing the twins to scuttle into the room with bars of chocolate stuffed in their hands, and money jingling in the pockets of their jackets as they leapt onto the bed and into their father's back, practically using him as a trampoline.

"What are you caterwauling about?" Dave asked as he entered the suite, his voice raspy after having smoked for years, but he had been forced to give it up after a heart attack in 1998. The African American man raised his eyebrows at his wife, before giving his niece a glowing grin, "Paige!" He beamed, holding out his arms as she moved towards him.

"Hey, Uncle Dave." Paige said with a loving tone, smiling broadly as she pulled away from the hug, "Okay, so, what's the plan? I haven't been to one of these things in like… seven years. Wow, that's a long time."

"Well, we're just going to let everyone settle into the hotel tonight. You know your Great Aunt Muriel and how testy she is after long car journeys, so avoid her for the rest of the evening if you know what's good for ya!" Julie warned, hitting Paige lightly on the arm, "Oh, Paige, guess who's making an appearance this year. Dona."

The witchlighter's face instantly fell, "Dona's here…?"

Julie rolled her eyes and gripped her niece's shoulders, "Paigey, I wouldn't worry. After the fool she made of herself last year, she'll be keeping a low profile… Honestly, I have never seen someone so drunk off their ass in my entire life!" She exclaimed, before Dave tapped her on the shoulder.

"Jules, the kids." He reminded her softly, nodding towards the two children who were currently wrestling with one another on the bed while Aidan tried to split it up. "I don't think Paige will appreciate you teaching them most of the words that come out your mouth." He said with a shake of his head, "C'mon, we need to go find your mother; I think she wandered off down the hall when she saw an antelope playing a saxophone… Crazy old crone." He muttered, beginning to walk out of the room while mumbling obscenities about the old woman in question.

"Oh, speaking of Mom…" Julie began, turning to Aidan, who had just succeeded in wrenching Emma off her sister while Melinda went to Paige, "… she said that you were to watch your back, and that you'd know what she'd mean." She relayed the message, frowning a little before shaking it off, "Anyway, see you guys at breakfast tomorrow!"

"Okay, bye!" Paige said with a large smile, closing the door to their room and locking it as her aunt left, letting out a grateful sigh, "… just so no one else decides to drop in. Is it bad that those two are the only people in my family that I actually like?"

"Hey, what am I? Chopped liver?" Aidan said with mock hurt as he bounced Emma on his knee, all the while the toddler shot hard glances at Melinda, which were returned with the same amount of heat.

"Well, if you don't watch out for my grandmother, you may well end up chopped liver." Paige said with a smirk.

Aidan let out another groan, looking down at the daughter on his lap before looking towards his wife, "I'm not going to make it through this weekend alive, am I?"

She answered with a similar groan, "Neither of us is."

* * *

"I still don't understand why you won't let me examine you. I am a doctor after all." Brennan protested as he, Phoebe, and Piper stepped into the hospital elevator, going down towards the underground parking lot. "I mean, you loathe going out of the house right now, so why don't you let me?" He asked again as his wife leaned against the metal railing on the back of the car.

"Because it's weird talking about stuff like this to a guy!" Phoebe snapped, cringing when she realized just how uncomfortable this conversation was making her, "Especially my own husband. Besides, you're not an OBG/YN, so I'd rather just keep my appointments with Dr. Troy."

Brennan shook his head, "That's hardly an excuse. The fact that I'm your husband should work in my favour, not against me."

The middle Charmed One sighed in response, turning to her big sister for support, "Piper, please back me up here."

Piper nodded in response, "She's right. When I was pregnant with Wyatt, Leo did a little too much research into the human reproductive system. Let's just say men should never say the word 'vulva'." She said flatly, stunning Brennan into silence and making Phoebe smile with delight as the elevator doors opened. "Dude, you're the one who brought it up. You can only blame yourself." She said with a snigger as they all stepped out of the car.

"So, anyway…" Phoebe began, her face clearly flushed as she changed the subject, "How's the restaurant going in its first month?"

"Good!" Piper said brightly, holding up her keys at her car on the other side of the lot and pressing the button on the car key, unlocking the vehicle as they slowly walked across the large expanse of cement. "We're above the average where first month profits are concerned, although I'm tempted to open up the bar in mornings to serve coffee. We're in the middle of the industrial part of town, so we'd get a lot of business from rushing employees looking for a morning boost."

"So, basically, you'd be making money from people's faulty alarm clocks?" Brennan smirked as he helped Phoebe into the passenger seat, pulling out the seatbelt so she wouldn't have to twist her body into an uncomfortable position.

Piper shot him a playful glare from the other side of the car, "Well, when you put it _that_ way, it just sounds sleazy."

Phoebe had a content chuckle to herself at the relaxed banter between the three of them. It was these small moments of normalcy that each Charmed One craved for, but they were usually too small to even be spotted. The witch smiled to herself as she buckled her seatbelt, before beaming at her husband, who leaned into the car and kissed her softly on the lips, returning her smile.

Their tender moment didn't last however, as a grey blur swooped from the ceiling, landing on the hood of the car and making vehicle bounce slightly from the force of the impact. Phoebe made eye contact with the creature immediately. It was the same demon that Annabelle had been chasing for the last month.

Slamming the car door shut angrily, Brennan swirled his wrists in a circular motion, electricity crackling in his hands before it was thrust outwards from his palms into two powerful tesla coils. The attack struck the creature in the chest, knocking it from its perch on the car hood and sending it rolling along the floor.

It recovered quickly, its wings beating furiously as it once again made eye contact with Phoebe through the windscreen, before throwing itself at Piper, mouth wide open, exposing its hideous teeth to the eldest Charmed One as it flew towards her, appearing to have the intent to kill her.

"Freeze it!" Brennan shouted, summoning another net of voltage into his hand, the lightning flashing wildly in his hand as he prepared to hit the creature once his sister in law had halted it.

Piper never froze it however. Instead, she took in a deep breath, massing out her left forearm and clubbing the being over the head when it came too close, sending it almost to the other side of the parking lot, tumbling along the ground before smacking off the wall, cracking the cement a little on impact. "Hey, I wanted to smack the thing in the teeth. Call it instinct." She spat when Brennan shot her a confused look.

Shaking his head at her behaviour, the mutant turned back to the demon to attack it once again, only to find it that it had vanished. He clenched his fists, the electricity that crackled in his hands diffusing with a snap. "What the hell is with that thing?" He breathed, knowing that it had also attacked Piper's children a month ago.

"I dunno. But something tells me I'm not dropping you guys off at your place anymore." Piper replied, knowing that all three of them should head back to the Manor to check the Book of Shadows. "Aw, Damnit! That son of a bitch left a dent in the hood! Okay, now it's personal." She seethed, yanking open the door on her side and hopping into the driver's seat, glaring at the two footprint-like dents in her car.

"Get in line…" Brennan growled, before clambering into the back seat as Piper started the engine.

* * *

Aidan took another swig of his beer, enjoying the blissful silence of the hotel bar. He looked at his watch, his eyes widening when he realized that he had been here for two and a half hours. The elemental was surprised that Paige hadn't called his cellphone yet, worried that something had happened to him. He suspected that his wife had probably passed out on the bed, as the twins had been a nightmare on the car journey here, and their energy hadn't depleted by the time they had reached their destination. Hopefully, all three of his girls were in bed, as two needed their sleep, and the third was just exhausted.

Another roar of laughter came from the other side of the large bar, where most of the Matthews family had gathered for the night. Aidan was thankful that this was his first reunion, and that none of them had seen him arrive with Paige earlier, as they were leaving him alone with his book for now, just giving him a friendly smile whenever they came up to refresh their drinks. All that would change tomorrow though, as breakfast would expose him. But for now, he was just an odd, bespectacled man reading a book at the bar.

"Looks like I win." A silky voice cooed to his right. Aidan turned a little in his barstool to see a blonde, soft featured woman giving him a warm smile from the stool next to his, before she took an elegant sip from her own beer.

He frowned at her statement, "Excuse me?"

She nodded towards the rowdy group of Matthews, "I've been watching you for the last twenty minutes from that rabble. I couldn't see your face, so I made a little bet with myself that you were cute." She smiled again, showing off a row of perfect teeth, "I win." She chuckled a little at Aidan's bemused expression, "Sorry if I came on a little strong, I've just been looking for a reason to escape from my family and you looked like good company."

"Oh…" The elemental breathed, smirking as he now understood, "So I'm not the only one who's trying to stay under the radar from them then."

The woman's face suddenly went white, "Oh God, if you're family, then the pass I made at you was just totally inappropriate and sick!" She grimaced at herself, suddenly losing her composure and slumping a little in her seat.

He laughed at her sudden fear, "No, don't worry. I'm an in law." Aidan informed her, holding up his hand and showing her the wedding band on his finger. "My wife's upstairs resting. We had a pretty long car ride from San Francisco."

"Oh, alright then." She replied, seeming to slip back into her relaxed posture and running the tip of her finger around the rim of her beer bottle, "Okay, then how about we start over without the sleazy pass I made at you?" She held out her hand, "I'm Dona."

"Aidan." The elemental introduced himself, shaking her hand and giving her a grin.

"So, if you don't mind me asking, what lucky Matthews girl grabbed you while you were still single?" Dona asked, stretching her upper body over the bar a little, nodding to the bartender, signaling that she wanted another beer, "Because trust me, a guy with your looks, reading in a bar… You wouldn't be sitting alone for long if you were in anything but this country hotel."

He let out a small laugh, closing his book and taking off his glasses, "Paige. We met around five years ago. We have two kids, twins. They turn four in a couple of months." Aidan explained, smiling a little when he realized the amount of time that had passed since his first meeting with Paige.

Dona's eyes widened as she let out one boom of laughter that unnerved Aidan slightly, "Wow, seriously? I would have never thought that Paige could be someone's wife. Let alone a _mother _of all things. I'm shocked…" She raised her beer bottle to her lips, smirking as she did.

"Why? Paige a great Mom." Aidan said coldly, beginning to develop a dislike for this woman.

"I think you'd be better asking your wife that…" She let out another laugh, finishing the rest of her beer just as the bartender brought her the second one, "Wife…" She repeated, clearly finding it funny. "Anyway, I had better go." Dona announced, putting her hands just above Aidan's knees as she pushed herself off the stool, "See you tomorrow, Aidan." She said darkly, before letting out another small laugh to herself.

Aidan merely shook his head, putting his glasses back on and returning to his book, "Bitch."

* * *

"So, two dents in my hood later, Brennan and I had fended off the thing." Piper spoke down the phone, finishing relaying the previous day's events. "I didn't get a chance to look at the book yesterday. I had to go the restaurant, and then the club, but I dropped Phoebe and Brennan off to see if they could find anything. They didn't, but I'm gonna double check now." She slowly began walking the foyer steps, heading to the attic.

"Okay, so you're calling just to add my already stressful weekend? Thanks, sis." Paige retorted sarcastically as she and her family made their way out of the hotel room, heading downstairs for breakfast. "And lady, I thought you had managers in both of your investments. What's with running yourself ragged trying to maintain both by yourself?"

Piper rolled her eyes as she reached the top of the stairs, "I do have managers, but I don't want to lose touch with P3, and at the same time, I want to make sure Thyme gets through these first few months." She let out a sigh, beginning to climb the steps of the attic, "I can't believe this. A demon attacked yesterday afternoon, and I'm only getting a chance to check the book the following morning. And by the way, I was only calling to make sure you're not completely in the dark if we have to call for you."

Paige instantly cringed at her eldest sister's remark, "When you say call… You mean on my cell, right?"

"Uh, no. I mean screaming at the ceiling until I'm blue in the face. Do you think I'm gonna have time to dial a number if there's a demon on my tail?"

"Of course not! Silly me…" Paige said with for too much false bravado as she pressed the button on the elevator. "Um, listen, Piper, I gotta go deal with some issues of my own right now, so call me on the cell if you need me." She said, not even giving her big sister a chance to respond and flipped her phone shut.

"Okay, I-," She cut herself off when all she got on the other end was a dial tone. "Thanks for your support…" She droned sarcastically, heading into the attic. She nearly fell back down the steps in surprise however, as the Book of Shadows suddenly flew across the room, landing on the floorboards with a thud, yet still pristine in its midnight blue cover. "Annabelle?" Piper breathed, seeing the Phoenix in question standing at the book's pedestal, clearly in a rage.

"I got a little angry. I'm sorry; I took it out on the book." Annabelle replied, her jaw clenched tightly as she stared at the tome on the floor, "I have to go. I have a demon to hunt down." She growled, before her body burst into a swirl of particles that flew out through the open window.

Piper cast a wary glance over the window that Annabelle had just flown out of. Walking across the attic, she picked up the book and gently returned it to its rightful place. She drew her hands over the gleaming silver triquetra, raising a questioning eyebrow at the cover. Phoebe always said that the book talked to her… maybe it would talk to her too? Piper took a few steps back, taking in a deep breath, "Speak."

The book flew open.

* * *

Melinda's eye twitched with anger as she felt another piece of scrambled egg hit her on the side of her face. She turned to her right, glowering at Emma, who had her fork in a catapult position, with a Cheshire grin on her face. "C'mon, Melly! I's bored! Won't you just play wif me?" She pleaded, putting her fork back onto her plate.

"Emma…" Paige began in a scolding voice, "If I see any more egg throwing, you'll be spending the rest of the day in the hotel room with only me as company." She warned. Although, in all honesty, Paige was hoping for her daughter's disobedience to shine through so that she wouldn't have to go out to the hills around the hotel tonight.

"Oh, Paigey! You can't do that!" Julie protested as she cut a piece off her slice of French toast and stuffed it into her mouth, "You'd be missing out on all the fun we're going to be having today. We have the luncheon around the pool at two, and then we have the picnic tonight at around eight… I can't wait."

"Oh, so you rhyme now?" Dave said gruffly, letting out a wheezy laugh as he picked away at his hard-boiled egg with a small spoon.

Julie lightly smacked her husband on the arm, "You know, it wouldn't kill you to be more positive. It's probably because of your attitude that Paige doesn't enjoy coming to the reunions. Besides, it's a great way for everyone to meet Aidan, and maybe even get to know you a bit better," She said, looking to her niece, "Seeing as how you haven't seen most of these people since you were a little girl."

"You know there's a reason for that…" Paige meekly protested, thankful when she felt Aidan's hand gently squeeze hers underneath the table. She let out a sigh, calmly putting down the fork that she had been using to flick her food around the plate for the last half hour. "Look, I'll come to the picnic tonight, but I don't think I can hack three meals in one day with everyone. I'm sorry, Aunt Julie."

Julie pursed her lips as an expression of disappointment and frustration crossed her face, "Alright, sweetie. You did good coming here. To be honest, I half expected you to just stay in your room all weekend." She lightly patted her husband's shoulder, "C'mon, Dave. We'd better go and find my mother and make sure she actually sat down for a meal."

"Okay." Dave replied softly, standing up and helping his wife to her feet as she grabbed to her crutch. "I'm glad you came out here, Paigey. Even it was just to see us." He smiled kindly, before walking away from the table.

"Do you wanna talk about it?" Aidan asked her gently as she stared down at her plate, still full from when she had loaded it up at the buffet. "You should eat something. It sounds like we're going to have a busy day."

"I'm not hungry." She replied flatly, "And no, I don't want to talk about… where are the kids?"

* * *

The hotel receptionist blew another large pink bubble from her mouth with her gum. This hotel was usually never very busy. Just above the average amount of guests normally. It was this family reunion that happened every year where everyone earned their overtime. She opened up a full spreadsheet document, doing a quick check over the name so she knew who to expect as the day progressed. She was so engrossed in the screen, that she didn't notice a swathe of blue and white lights grip itself around the handle on one of the drawers of the filing cabinet behind her, and silently drag it open.

She noticed a few typos in the spreadsheet and let out a groan. A newbie had been on shift before her, and messed up almost everything on the roster. With a roll of her eyes, she began to fix the mistakes, reaching for the mouse, all the while keeping her eyes on the screen, not seeing the piece of computer equipment erupt into a cloud of bubbles, along with the cable, and vanish, and reappearing on the floor in a torrent of water.

Her hand hit the mouse pad, and she looked down with a frown before noticing it was on the floor. Deciding that is must have fallen off the desk and had been yanked out of the computer due to the fall. She reached down to get it, before a loud rustling of paper caught her attention and forced to turn around. Nothing could have prepared her for what she saw next.

One by one, and at a very fast rate, every single document in the filing cabinet drawer was flying out of the drawer in either a cloud of bubbles or lights, and hurling itself into the air. It only took a few seconds for the top drawer to empty itself, before bubbles devoured the handle of the second drawer, pulling it open and repeating the destructive process until the entire reception area was caught in a storm of paper.

The receptionist let out a scream when every handle on the filing cabinet was gripped by lights and bubbles, wrenching the drawers back and forth and making a horrible repetitive clatter. She turned back around to hide under her desk, just in time to see her computer screen disappear in a swirl of bright lights, closely followed by the tower, which vanished from sight in mound of glowing bubbles.

Melinda and Emma suppressed their laughter as they watched the receptionist finally leap from her seat and head for the exit, as her own workspace seemed to have turned against her. Their amusement turned to confusion however, as the entire seen suddenly froze in motion. Paper was suspended in the air, the filing cabinet drawers where mid caught in mid-slam, and even some things had been caught in the middle of being orbed or splashed out.

Someone cleared their throat behind them, making their hearts sink immediately as they turned around to face their parents. "It's a good thing you guys do a Grade A haunting, because I have half a mind to turn you into ghosts myself!" Paige spat, hands on her hips, knowing that her freezing spell only worked on a small area, so if someone were to come into the lobby, they would be caught.

"It was her idea!" The twins said in unison, pointing to one another, "Was not!" They said together again, turning to face each other, "Was too!" They said again, before Paige let out a shrill whistle, silencing them both.

"I don't care whose idea it was." The youngest Charmed One informed them calmly, before turning her attention to the frozen scene in front of her, quickly looking around before doing any more magic, "Let the object of objection become but a dream, as I cause the seen to become unseen."

A wave of golden light washed over the reception area, instantly setting everything back to the why it was before the twins' telekinetic havoc had began. All the paper flew back into the filing cabinet, the computer reappeared in the same light, with mouse intact, and the receptionist vanished from her frozen running position near the exit, returning to her desk chair and going back to the spreadsheet.

"You know, your Mom and I should bind your powers for that, you snuck out of breakfast just to give that woman the fright of her life." Aidan scolded the two of them, kneeling down to their level while Paige still towered above them in a threatening pose. He was about to continue, before he noticed someone walking towards the four of them. "Oh, great…" He groaned, scooping his two children into his arms as Dona approached them.

"Paige!" The blonde greeted them brightly with an odd twinkle in her eye. "I've looking for you all over the place. I mean, at first, I thought you were going to be a no show again, but then I met your husband in the bar last night and since then, I've been dying to catch up."

"Hi, Dona…" The witchlighter said in a small voice, taking her hands off her hips and losing all of the confidence she had just moments ago. "What did Aidan and you talk about last night?" She asked with a clenched jaw, shooting a glare at her husband who avoided her gaze.

"Oh, just some stuff… He didn't understand why I though it was so funny that you were a mother, not to mention someone's wife! I still remember the girl in high school who…" Dona purposefully paused, making the colour drain from Paige's face, "… always used to say 'I'm not going to become some man's bitch!'… How things change." She smiled wryly, before turning to Aidan and giving a warm grin to the twins in his arms, "Aw! Cute kids! Lovely green eyes, gorgeous blonde hair… Sure they're yours?" She said darkly to Paige, who glared in return.

"Looks aren't the only thing that define a person, Dona." Paige said with a tight smile, "Personality, intell… Oh…" She said with false sadness, looking her cousin up and down, "Good thing you've kept good care of your looks, sweetie."

Dona's eye twitched a little before she responded with a smirk, "Oh, don't worry about it, honey. I have been taking care of myself, while you on the other hand have always been a bit drab, even when we were teenagers. But hey, that didn't stop you from getting-,"

"Shut up." Paige growled menacingly, glowering at the blonde as she walked past her, heading for the food hall of the hotel.

"Be seeing you…" Dona said airily, strutting off down the hallway with a wiggle in her hips, obviously very pleased with herself.

"What the hell was that all about?" Aidan asked, taking a step towards her as she just stared out towards the exit with a mixture of anger, shame, and… guilt?

"It's nothing… I'm just gonna go for a drive or something. I'll be back later." She laid, pulling the keys to Aidan's Mitsubishi Shogun out of her pocket and striding towards the exit with a fast pace, as if she was trying to escape.

As he was too caught up in trying to go after Paige, Aidan didn't even notice his daughters take each other's hand while they looked over his shoulder from their perch in his arms. Sharing a mischievous glance, they reached their free arm over Aidan's shoulder, gesturing at Dona's back, and in a flash of white light, a tiny Chihuahua stood in her pace, yapping with a high pitched tone. Smiling at one another again, the twins bumped their small fists together, pleased with what they had done. Dona was really the one to blame. After all, she was the one who had given them the idea by saying the word 'bitch'.

* * *

A cloud of particles made a buzzing noise echo through the leafy, deserted clearing in Golden Gate Park as they approached the ground, before swirling in a tornado and coming together, forming Annabelle. The Phoenix spun slowly in a circular pattern, the leaves crunching under her feet as she did. The late afternoon summer sun was shining through the swaying tree branches, causing shafts of light to flash over her face now and again as she walked further into the forest like area.

A small whimper caught her attention and she immediately spun on her heel to find its source. She heard it again, smirking when she spotted her prey crouching on a tree branch, trying to nurse the wounds it had sustained from its confrontation with Brennan and Piper the previous day, prodding its sizzling flesh with a tentative claw, obviously still feeling the burn from the electric assault it had endured.

Silently, Annabelle reached into her jean pocket, pulling out a potion vial filled with a deep purple liquid and gripping it in her palm. "I'm sorry it has to end this way." She said with a smirk, getting the demon's attention as she wheeled back her arm. Immediately, the creature tried to take off, but it seemed that Brennan's tesla coils had injured it all over, along with its blurry eyesight, due to Piper's massed out arm, and as a result, it only rose a few feet before falling back to the branch.

Annabelle let the potion fly from her hand, spinning towards its target as the mercenary watched with glee. Her happiness was thwarted however, when the vial froze in mid air, along with the demon, which had been trying to get more wind beneath its wings to take off. She frowned in confusion, before realizing what had happened and turning around with a thunderous expression, "What the hell do you think you're doing?" She spat angrily at Piper, who still had her hand out in the freezing gesture, "That demon is mine. Unfreeze him, now."

"Sure, just as long as you clue me in to why you're after this thing so much." Piper retorted calmly, trying to conceal that fact that one of her hands was behind her back.

"Oh, and you don't think the way it went after me in the Elemental Chamber is reason enough?" She spat back, gesturing to the frozen creature in the branches, "I still have some fading scars from its attack, Paige didn't even complete the job. But hey, why don't you try calling for her help now? I'm sure you'll be pleasantly surprised." Annabelle said a knowing smirk. "How did you know I was here anyway?"

Piper frowned at Annabelle cryptic statement before answering, "A little book told me." She growled, suddenly whipping her arm out from behind her back and hurling the Phoenix vanquishing potion at the blonde's direction, readying her hands in case she had to finish the job if the potion didn't work.

It turned out that she would have to finish the job; the potion collided with Annabelle's shoulder, leaving only a wisp of smoke and cut on her shoulder from where the shattered glass had sliced her skin. The mercenary looked down at her wound as it slowly began to sizzle, the skin knitting itself back up again as Piper watched in horror and surprise, "Not the desired effect, I presume?" She smirked.

Deciding not to even give Annabelle the opportunity to retaliate, Piper flung out her hands, and instantly regretted attempting to do this by herself. The blast wasn't even visible, the only sign that it had worked was the few steps back Annabelle took, and the annoyed expression on her face. "What the hell are you?" Piper asked with a gasp, something in the back of her mind screaming that she had seen the same sort of reaction before.

"I'm something that's very surprised I lasted this long, that's what." Annabelle replied, bringing an energy ball into the palm of her hand. She continued to talk over the loud crackling coming from the projectile in her hand, "I was sent to infiltrate your life, and get as much information from the Book of Shadows as possible. It is, after all, where all your magical knowledge lies, thanks to the boost the Higher Beings gave it. Of course, everything was going fine until the book started to sense my intentions a couple of months ago…"

_Annabelle hurriedly threw ingredients into the steaming potion pot. Piper was still outside, practicing with that elemental bow, and the others had followed, so she hoped she would have enough time to make the aura cloaking potion. With all the drama that had been happening recently, she had completely forgot that she had to drink from a fresh batch every month to make sure the Book of Shadows never exposed her._

_The book in question was sitting on the counter, open at the aura cloaking potion, next to Annabelle. The potion was originally supposed to be used to cloak good auras from evil tomes, but with a few changes to the ingredients, it had the opposite effect. "Almost done…" She smirked to herself, raising the Kappa scale above the potion pot. Out of sheer habit, she reached for the book to check the ingredient, only for it to light up with a white hot glow and hurl itself off the counter, closing neatly as it the ground._

"_The hell…?" Maxwell breathed from the kitchen doorway, obviously having seen everything._

_Moving fast, Annabelle dropped the scale into the potion, striding quickly around the counter and glowering at Maxwell, "Damnit…" She raised her hand, a violent stream of lilac energy flying from her hand and striking the fire elemental in the chest, throwing him back against the doorframe before he slid to the floor, the blast leaving no evidence on his person or clothes._

"_What the hell happened?" Aidan asked as he entered from the back door, clearly aghast at the chaos in the kitchen as the potion pot suddenly exploded, letting out a plume of black smoke that set off the smoke detector while the pot in question seemed to have burst from the force of the explosion, rips in the stainless steel viciously ruining the makeshift cauldron._

"_I don't know. I was making vanquishing potions for the fight later; he walked in, looked at what I was doing and then just… fell! He knocked the book of the counter in the process." She said, nodding at the fallen tome on the floor that had somehow managed to land perfectly closed, an odd glimmer of green coming from the silver triquetra that Aidan was sure was just a trick of the eye._

"… but I think I managed to get enough on you. Well, enough to execute the plan at least." She said darkly, hurling the energy ball at Piper, who barely managed to blow it up just a foot away from her. The sphere exploded, the resulting shockwave throwing Piper over a small part of the clearing, landing with a thud in a pile of dead leaves.

Annabelle was able to use this distraction to complete what she had set out to do. Turning around, she grabbed the potion that Piper had frozen out of mid-air, and grinned at the fact her target was immobile right now. She flung it towards the creature. It cracked against its side with a dark purple explosion and it immediately unfroze, letting out a blood-curdling screech of pain as it slowly tried to fly away.

"Oh no you don't…" The blonde growled lowly, preparing to go after the demon, until she felt something rough around her ankles. She looked down, her eyes widening with shock as it seemed that tree roots had extended from their usual positions and had bound her legs with a tight vice grip. She didn't have time to put much more thought into it, as one of the thicker branches suddenly struck her abdomen, throwing her out of the root's grip and hurling her across the clearing.

Piper calmly stood behind her, a faint orange glow over her palm as she guided nature to attack her enemy. As if sensing her commanding position, the leaves that were on the ground were suddenly swept up in a wind outside Piper's control, surrounding her in a tornado of the dead foliage as she advanced on Annabelle. The rest of the small forest around her seemed to follow.

"You've been in league with him this entire time, haven't you?" Piper said, beginning to put all the pieces together, summoning more tree roots to keep Annabelle pinned down, "Diam's still alive, isn't he?" She asked, already knowing the answer. What she really wanted to know if there was any hope for Leo's return.

Annabelle smirked, pulling at the roots that had latched themselves around her wrists and ankles, keeping her standing in the same spot. She could easily escape, but she felt like she should humour the eldest Charmed One, even for a little while. "Like you even need to ask that question." She chuckled. "You knew he was still alive the moment Leo orbed out of the crypt's chamber, you just wanted to believe that your husband hadn't sacrificed himself for nothing… That he was gone forever."

"You're lying!" Piper shouted, tightening the roots that were binding her prey to the ground.

Annabelle winced. This was starting to hurt a little, "Bite me, witch!" She spat, before exploding into a cloud of particles that flew from her captor's grasp and towards the sky, making the roots tighten around air for a split second, before returning to the ground as Piper relinquished control over them.

"Damnit…" The eldest Charmed One growled, clenching her fists. Her heart suddenly began to pound when she remembered Annabelle's foreboding words regarding her youngest sister. "Paige…: She whispered, before grabbing a potion from her pocket and throwing it to the ground. The vial shattered, letting out a puff of smoke, and instantly Piper vanished in a swirl of white lights.

* * *

Paige sat with her legs crossed just outside of the rest o the family's earshot. She was staring out onto a beautiful valley, where the sun was setting behind the left hill, casting a gentle orange hue over the idyllic scene that seemed to spread for miles before her. The witchlighter took in a deep breath, inhaling the beautiful scent of the various plant life that was around. It was such a peaceful place.

She could hear laughter just at the top of the hill she was sitting on. She knew that the rest of her family were up there, enjoying the scenery and each other's company, while she sat down here, picking at the grass with a pang of resentment going through her body. It had always been like this at family reunions, and even worse after her parents had died. She felt like such an outsider after their death. Her Aunt Julie and Uncle Dave had really been the ones to welcome her with open arms and treat her like their child. Paige always thought that it was just because her father had been Julie's brother, but she had learned that that had nothing to do with it just shortly after her parents' funeral.

_Paige bared her teeth, her braces glimmering in the cold light of the garage as she threw another bucket of paint at the once immaculate white canvas. She stuck a large paintbrush into the pot, swiping it in the air and causing a stripe of bright green paint to fly across the canvas, adding the vivid display of anger and emotion that seemed to jump off the flat surface._

_Her Aunt Julie had been watching from her perch on top of her car bonnet. For the funeral, she had dressed surprisingly conservatively. Instead of her normal bright coloured clothes, she wore smart grey pants with a black and grey striped poncho. She looked a little like a sepia toned bumble bee, "That's it, Paigey!" She cried passionately, imitating her niece's brush movements with tears in her eyes. The day Paige lost her parents had also been the day that Julie lost her brother, "There's some blank space to the bottom right! Smack it with some of the cyan!" She gaped when Paige suddenly picked up a pot of dark magenta paint and threw it at the bottom left corner of the canvas. "Hell! That works even better than the damn cyan!" She boomed, managing to smile through her grief as Paige continued to assault the canvas with everything she had._

_Neither of them even knew how long they stayed in that garage. After Paige had thrown around every paint pot, she went around, picking up the cans and dispersing the remains with the paint brush, until there wasn't a white spot left on the canvas. Julie could honestly say it was the best piece of artwork she had ever seen. It had come from raw passion, grief, anger. Emotion. Which, in her opinion, was something all artwork needed._

_Paige let go of the paint can in her hand, causing small splurges of canary yellow paint to splash onto the outfit she had worn to the funeral as the pot crashed to the floor. She backed up, staring at her work as she joined her aunt on the car bonnet. "It's finished…" The teen breathed, still in a trance as Julie put an arm around her shoulders._

"_I think so too…" She replied softly, kissing Paige on the top of the head and smiling at the fact both of them were covered in paint. "I'm gonna take care of you, Paigey… We're gonna do this every day… And eventually, it won't hurt as much."_

_Paige's bottom lip quivered as she leaned into her aunt, "I hope so…"_

Now that Paige thought back, her Aunt Julie had been the one to spark her flare for art. She smiled at the memory. It had been one of most trying times in life, but her family had helped her through it. The same applied to her sisters. Even though she felt as though she had a foot in each camp, she had gone through her hardest times with each side of her family. She needed both of them in her life, and, no matter how imperfect they were, they were all she had, and she wasn't about to throw it all away just because she felt like the lonely adopted child now and again.

Besides, she had made quite the perfect little family herself, and she was reminded of that when Aidan suddenly appeared at her side, sitting down on the grass next to her as the twins ran down the hill a little more, playing with a small Chihuahua that seemed to have come from nowhere. "How are you?" The elemental asked softly, knowing how his wife had left the hotel that morning.

Paige turned to him, smiling, before leaning in a replying to his question with a passionate kiss. Aidan turned a little so he wasn't at such an uncomfortable angle, putting his hand on her cheek as they pulled away from other, "I'm absolutely fine." She said confidently. "It just took my brain a couple of hours to realize that I have everything I need right here!" She said, laughing as she smacked his knee with her hand. "Hey… Where did that dog come from?" She asked, frowning when she saw the animal the twins were playing with.

Aidan turned away from her to look at their children, "You know, I have no idea. It was just up with the rest of the family, pulling on people's pant legs, when the girls saw it and decided they'd have some fun with it." He said, frowning, "But, now that you mention it, it does familiar… Maybe we just miss Sandy?"

Paige narrowed her eyes, focusing her sight on something, "Is that a collar? Or a… necklace?" She asked, sure that she had been whatever it was somewhere before. Her eyes widened when she realized what the object was, and what her children must have done. "Oh my God!" She shot to her feet, racing down the hill as quick as she could with her husband hot on her heels.

"Hey, Mommy!" Melinda greeted her brightly, teasing the small dog in front of her with a sausage she had taken from the barbeque, giggling while doing so.

"You guys, did you…? Piper?"

Sure enough, Piper was walking towards them from the bottom of the hill at an extremely fast pace. It only took her a few seconds to reach her sister, and she seemed out of breath, "Finally! I spent all morning looking for Annabelle… And then I spend all night looking for you!"

"Is there something wrong?" Paige asked, confused, before mentally groaning when she realized that she had left her cell phone in the hotel in her haste to make a getaway. "Oh, I don't have my cell phone… what's up?"

Piper shook her head as she regained her breath, leaning down a little, "To time for that! Home. Now!"

"Okay…" Paige warily, before turning back to her daughters and taking the typical scolding stance of putting her hands on her hips, "But first of all, turn Dona back. _Now_."

* * *

Brennan moved across the living room as quietly as could, carrying the glass of water that Phoebe had requested during one of her many waking hours during the night. He walked slowly past his two nephews and niece, who were sleeping on the large fold out bed in the sofa. Piper had arrived at their doorstep earlier in the evening, requesting they look after the kids until she got back, but she had yet to return. On top of taking care of Sandy and her one remaining puppy, Brennan was starting to feel the strain of being the only one in the house capable of doing most things.

He began to start back up the stairs, stifling a yawn by covering his mouth before he heard a sharp gasp of pain coming from upstairs. Resisting the urge to drop the glass of water and bolt upstairs, Brennan made his way up as quickly and quietly as he could, laying the glass down at the small set of drawers that were at the top of the stairs.

Phoebe was leaning against the doorframe of their bedroom, clutching her stomach and grimacing at whatever pain she was feeling. Brennan rushed to her side, keeping her upright as she let out another gasp of pain, except this time it come out as more of a wail, "Honey, what is it? What's wrong?" He asked, knowing that it wasn't time.

Phoebe pursed her lips, trying to talk through her pain, "Bren… We need to go to the hospital…" She breathed, leaning on the wall and on the support of her husband, "My water just broke."

* * *


	17. Keep The Faith, Baby, Part I

**Keep The Faith, Baby: Part 1**

Annabelle walked down the wreckage filled corridor of Magic School. She liked the darkness that now seemed to hang low in the halls. Her lips curled into a smile at the sight of the place. She was rather pleased with how this little project had turned out, as she had managed to get the information that they needed from the Book of Shadows. Anything else she had learned from the book, or about the Charmed Ones, was just an added bonus.

Hearing the flipping of pages coming from one of the rooms that led off from the hall, Annabelle sauntered in to find Diam sitting on a desk, casually looking through one of the many books that had been on the large shelf that ran around the entire room, casting his soulless eyes over the pages, "Well, it's certainly better than a lot of the places we've stayed in over the centuries, but it's still a dump. I thought we agreed that you were going to get this place ready, while I got the information we needed." She asked, folding her arms.

"Did you know witches can't walk across salted earth?" Diam suddenly stated, letting out a small chuckle, "And that some witches used to try and get burnt at the stake, as they believed they had the power to revive themselves and become stronger as beings on their second life… Do you remember fighting witches back during the hunts?" He asked her, closing the book.

Annabelle shrugged, "They believed a lot more in their craft than witches do these days. To an extent, they were more powerful… What does this have to do with you answering my initial question?" She asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Well, you know me. I like to be thorough. There were still some irritating students hanging around, so I got rid of them. The Elder that was put in charge of restoring the school was a little more resistant than the rest of them when I asked him to leave, but he won't be bothering us." He looked around, pointing to one of the destroyed walls of the room and showing Annabelle that it was beginning to restore itself, "I just began fixing it. And besides, what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be out hunting demons for the Charmed Ones?" He had a small chuckle to himself at the thought.

Annabelle smirked wryly in return, "Nope. The book exposed me. It doesn't really matter anyway. We were going to put the plan into motion today whether or not they knew who I really was, and the fact that Phoebe went into labour around half an hour ago will also help our cause."

"So, does that mean we're still going after Wyatt? With the Charmed Ones preoccupied, the kids will be easy targets." Diam asked for conformation. They had been planning this over since his supposed join disappearance with Leo.

Annabelle shook her head, "Wyatt is useless to us now. He's had the growth spurt all magical children have and is no longer very powerful. Albeit, he's retained his power of though projection, but unless he has something to draw on, he's weak." She turned towards the door. "The twins are too strong with their joint power, so that just leaves Connor."

* * *

Lexa took in a deep breath as she wearily rubbed her temples, closing her eyes for the smallest of moments before bringing herself back to reality. She had been here for a total of two hours, and she had only seen Phoebe and Brennan twice. Jesse had managed to get out of looking after the kids by saying he was going to go and track down Phoebe's doctor, but Lexa knew that he had probably gone for some alone time in the lobby.

The maternity ward waiting room has decorated with things that you'd expect to see in this part of a hospital. Large storks carrying babies had been painted onto the sky blue wall, with candy canes raining down from puffy white clouds above the large birds. Lexa couldn't understand why maternity wards were such a happy place. From what she heard, labour was the most painful thing a woman could ever endure. And what did she get for her troubles? A screaming, helpless baby that can't even control its bodily functions.

She jumped with surprise when something rammed into her leg. The mutant looked down to see her godson staring up at her with wide, innocent eyes, playing with the train that had had a collision with her shin. "Connor…" She said slowly, her patience - which was usually infinite with Connor - was beginning to wear thin. "It's three o'clock in the morning. Boys your age should be sleeping right now. Why don't you curl up on the sofa and go to sleep? Lorna's done that and look how happy she looks." She gestured to the small redhead that was in a bundle next to her, smiling in her sleep, obviously dreaming of something that pleased her.

Connor shook his head vigorously, "Not tired!" He assured her confidently, before turning his attention to the fight that had just broken out between Wyatt and Chris over whose turn it was to play the PSP. There were perfect examples of why she didn't want to be a mother.

Before she could move to break it up, the sound of clacking heels caught Lexa's attention. All the nurses and doctors wore flat shoes, so she could only that it was Phoebe's sisters who were about to come around the corner. Sure enough, Piper was the first one to appear, closely followed by Paige. The eldest Charmed One's eyes quickly scanned the small room, instantly finding her boys arguing. "Hey, you two, knock it off!" Piper boomed, taking control and snatching the handheld gaming system from her sons' hands. "Go wait down the hall. I'll be there in a minute and I'll take you home. Come on." She turned off the gaming system and guided them down the hall, ignoring the shouts of despair from the boys as their mother destroyed their high scores with just a flick of a switch.

"What took you two so long to get here?" Lexa snapped, the stress of looking after four children at three in morning beginning to show. She stood up; ready to stride over and let loose on the Charmed Ones for taking so long, but then she saw a sleeping Lorna out of the corner of her eye and decided she'd best stay quiet.

"Well, I didn't take any portal potions with me because I thought I would get an orb back. Then she and her husband decide to drive!" Piper exclaimed, turning to Paige and putting her hands on her hips. "Speaking of which, why _did_ we have to make a six hour drive when you or Aidan could have gotten us here in an instant?"

Paige blinked a few times, biting her lip, "Well… We weren't just going to leave Aidan's car up there. And besides, what was the rush? Would you have rather been in an uncomfortable waiting room for two and a half hours or a comfortable car with beautiful nighttime scenery?"

"Speaking from personal experience, I would have switched with you any day…" Lexa groaned in Piper direction, "Brennan called me and Jesse an hour ago when you guys didn't show up instantly. He wanted to distract her from the fact that you two weren't here."

Piper sighed, shrugging off her jacket and gently placed it over the sleeping form of her surrogate daughter, "Where is Phoebe?" She asked, folding her arms as she waited for an answer.

Lexa raised her arm, pointing down the corridor, "Down there, third room on the left." She explained, "Hey wait-!" She didn't even have the chance to protest about being left with the children, as Paige and Piper shot down the corridor, nearly sending a nurse to the floor with their speed as they brushed past her.

"Auntie Lexa…?" Connor asked wearily. Being awake at this time wasn't a natural occurrence for him, and the lack of routine sleep was taking its toll. The four year old tugged on her pant leg impatiently, raising his eyebrows questioningly, "Where do babies come from?"

At this, Lexa's eyes widened to the size of saucers as her face turned red. She whipped her eyes up to the ceiling, rolling them with a cringe, "You have _got_ to be kidding me…!" She hissed to herself, before regaining her composure and looking down at her godson, "See that wall?" She asked, pointing to the wall which had the picture of the baby carrying stork, "That will tell you everything you need to know!"

* * *

"What the hell took you guys so long to get here?" Phoebe instantly questioned as her sisters entered the room. Her face had a tinge of furious red, which made it look like sunburn, while her tousled hair was sticking to the sides of her sweaty face. "Did you just forget that I was giving birth to my child?" She snapped again, causing Brennan to rub his head with his free hand, as the other one was in Phoebe's grip and had turned a light purple from the pressure she put on it when a contraction coursed through her body.

"I'm sorry!" Piper instantly apologized, standing next to her younger sister's bed and moving away the strands of hair that had been plastered to her cheeks, "We would have been here sooner, but _someone_ took the scenic route…" She growled, looking over at Paige who was sitting at the bottom of the bed.

The witchlighter affectionately squeezed her sister's ankle from her spot on the bed, "Well, we're here now… And we'll come straight back after we've dropped the kids off at the Manor." Paige grimaced at Phoebe's expression when she relayed this news to her, watching Brennan wince in pain as she tightened the grip on his hand.

"Okay… Honey?" He asked caringly, before snapping a little, "Pheebs, I'm gonna need to leave and go to get treated for broken fingers if you keep squeezing that hard!" He said, instantly pulling his hand away from her when she let go, smiling a little when they returned to their normal colour and regained circulation.

"Um, actually, now that you're free…" Piper began, grabbing Brennan by the wrist and pulling Paige up off the bed. "You should probably come and calm down Connor. He's a little worried about what's going on in here." She advised, remembering how Phoebe had told her that the last time she was at a hospital, her son thought she was dying.

Phoebe let out an aggravated sigh as the three of them left, before clutching her stomach painfully. "You know, if you just want to come out now, that would be great…" She murmured impatiently to her engorged mid-section, before her eyes suddenly rolled to the back of her head and she fell back against her pillow, her arms dropping to her sides as she fell asleep.

The middle Charmed One's hair moved softly in the wind that was brought in by the swirl of buzzing particles that deposited Annabelle at her bedside. The blonde's expression stayed hard as she held her hand over Phoebe's chest, "Power of the witches rise, course unseen across the skies, come to us who call you near, come to us and settle here…"

Phoebe's body glowed faintly for a few seconds, before a stream of pale blue globes of light flew from her chest, her powers transferring themselves to a different in the form of Annabelle, who held out her hand in preparation for the stream of light to enter her through her palm, "Sorry, Phoebe, but we couldn't have you making a loud fuss while I did this…" She murmured softly, before vanishing in the swirl of particles that had brought her here.

The moment she disappeared, Phoebe seemed to regain consciousness. Her eyes fluttered open and she frowned as she looked around the empty hospital room. She figured she must have just nodded off her the smallest of moments due to the fatigue that was draining her of whatever was left of her energy. She didn't have time to think about it though, as another contraction hit her like a punch to the stomach.

"_Brennan!_"

* * *

"Did it work?" Diam asked as his comrade reformed in the centre of the room. He was sitting casually on the desk, watching with wonder when Annabelle extended her arm, revealing that a small cloud glowing lights was swirling in her hand. "I'll take that as a yes then…" He murmured, jumping off the table. "The summoning potion just needs one final ingredient to work. I was waiting on you."

"Good." She replied, "After all, we both know what happens we directly take someone's powers into us." She warned, before giving an odd look at the swathe of lights in front of her, "Maybe we should wait until we get Connor's power before summoning the Krontok. The witches could end up drawing on the kid's power to vanquish it and then we're left with nothing."

"Normally, I would agree, but we don't have anywhere else to put Phoebe's powers, and who knows? Maybe Connor will come with the Krontok willingly if he sense his mother's powers," Diam replied, grabbing a large piece of sage from the table he had been sitting on and walking over the small potion pot that was hung over a fire on the floor, "Shall I?"

"You shall," She replied, slamming her hands together and letting the powers escape from her grasp, hovering above her head as they waited for the right host and casting a pale blue glow over the woman that stood underneath them. "From what I read in the witches' Book of Shadows, Krontoks are weasels. Once we give him the powers of a Charmed One, we're going to have to keep an eye on him."

"Gotcha…" Diam murmured in response, dropping the sage into the potion pot and watching as a cloud of black smoke erupted from the cauldron with a bang. The smoke seemed to take on a life of its own, swirling around the hall before making a funnel in between Annabelle and Diam, depositing an extremely surprised Krontok demon in its place.

The evil being had tribal tattoos running all the way down the right side of his pale green skin. "What the-?" He was cut off when the cloud of lights suddenly flew into his chest, throwing him to the floor from the force of their intrusion. He attempted to get back up, but a foot on his chest prevented that from happening.

Annabelle looked down at the demon she was pinning to the floor, leaning down so that her hair hung over her face, giving it an ominous shadow in the darkness of the early morning. "We have a little job offer for you…" She informed him, glancing over to Diam before staring the Krontok in the eye, "You interested?"

* * *

"You know, I can go back to the hospital myself if you want. You look like you're about to drop dead any minute. Get some rest." Paige gently offered to her tired sister, who was flipping through the Book of Shadows at a worrying rate, adamant about staying awake at all costs.

"No. I'm fine; I just wanted to have a check through this before we went back." She turned to Aidan, who was currently rubbing his eyes from his seat at the table. "Are you going to alright looking after all the kids?"

The elemental stifled a yawn before answering her, "Yeah, they're all asleep. I should be fine. You guys go back to the hospital and be there for Phoebe. I'll stay here and look through the book." He raised himself to his full height, letting out a sigh, "I just need to go and get my glasses from the car." He turned on his heel and headed for the stairs, yawning again as he did.

Paige rubbed her sister's back soothingly, "This isn't your fault, you know. We made the decision together to let her into our lives, to trust her with our children… None of us could have seen what was going to happen. Expect maybe Phoebe, and we can't hold it against her just because her power is unreliable…" She said with a smile, trying to make a joke. "Don't let this get to you."

"I know I shouldn't, but…" Piper let out a groaned of frustration, clenching her fists and walking away from the book and wearily running a hand through her glossy hair, "… She was under our nose this entire time. Hell, maybe Leo was onto her and that's why he's now gone! I just can't believe that our enemy has been living in my basement, probably trying to undo us from the inside-,"

"You can't go through all the possible situations…" Paige interrupted her softly. "Look, we screwed up. Now, we're going to deal with it like we always do and vanquish her sorry ass. Now that we know the Phoenix potion doesn't work, we'll think of another way!"

Piper put her hands on her hips, sucking in her top lip and staring down at the floor, "I hope you're right…"

* * *

Brennan was sitting up next to his wife on the hospital bed as another contraction shuddered through her body. She placed her hands to her stomach, only letting out a small gasp of pain as it hit. She had been having them for last few hours, and by now, they nothing but uncomfortable. The middle Charmed One let out a sigh and settled into the nook between Brennan's chest and arm as he had it around her shoulders, "Don't leave me during this one… Alright?" She said with a faint smile on her face, thinking of the turbulent birth Connor had had.

He smiled fondly at the memory, kissing her on the temple and pulling her in a little closer to his chest. "I'm not going anywhere outside these four walls this time. I promise." The mutant assured her, looking to the door as he was expecting Piper and Paige to burst back through any minute.

Footsteps got louder, only to reveal that it was Jesse who was making his way towards the room, "Hey, I just checked with your doctor. He said that since you're two weeks early, they're going to be taking things pretty slow. And since your water broke, there's no chance of them using drugs to halt the labour." He relayed quickly, raising a questioning eyebrow at Brennan when he groaned in frustration.

"Jess, I could have told you that! Did he give you any useful information?" He snapped, rubbing his head. The fatigue that they were all feeling was causing him to become short tempered. "Look, I'm sorry… Did he say anything else?"

Jesse shook his head slowly, "Nope. He didn't stay around to talk very long. There was a tram/bus collision and practically every doctor is down in the A&E trying to save all the critical patients. They're spread pretty thin." He explained, shaking his head again, "You should see the amount of blood down there… So many casualties."

Phoebe frowned. There had to be at least thirty critical patients even in the early morning, "Huh… That's weird. With all the pain and grief that's probably going on downstairs, I would have thought I would be sensing at least some of it." She shrugged it off, "Oh well, maybe it's just-AH!" She suddenly lunged forward, clutching her stomach and nearly tearing through hospital gown she was wearing, "No…" She whispered, clearly seeing something apart from the back of her eyelids. "Aidan…? Connor… NO!"

"What the hell is wrong? We could hear her from down the corridor!" Lexa exclaimed as she rushed into the room with Piper and Paige hot on her heels, watching as Phoebe clutched her head in extreme pain, before flopping back onto the bed with tears streaming down her face.

"The baby… She gave me another monition…" Phoebe breathed; her bottom lip began to quiver with fear, "A demon… It knocked out Aidan…" She took in a deep breath, before a heart wrenching sob followed. "It took Connor!"

* * *

Brennan viciously swung the scrying crystal over the map, grinding his teeth with anger while trying to keep the amethyst at a speed that would allow it to drop onto the map without skidding along the table. The mutant wasn't even using anything of Connor's to scry with. He knew that the connection they had through their blood and powers would be more enough. If Connor was anywhere on this map, he would be found.

Paige walked into the attic, her shoes sending a loud clacking through the tense silence of room as she moved towards her husband, carrying some aspirin and a glass of water, "Here… These should help with the headache." She said softly, watching as Aidan ingested the two small tablets. "How did he get past you?" She gently inquired.

The elemental let out a sigh, "I don't know…" He groaned, rubbing his head, "I heard Connor shout out for me, I went to him and found the demon trying to get through his shield, and… this is going to sound weird, but…" He looked to his side, facing Paige, "I think he used Phoebe's powers to take me down."

"What?"

"I know! But… I saw a light coming at me, and the next thing I knew… It felt as if my head was about to explode." He looked up towards Brennan, who had his back to him, "I'm sorry. I'm gonna fight like hell to get him back."

"Don't worry about it." Brennan replied stonily, keeping his eyes focused on the path of the crystal as it violently spun around the map. "It sounds like there's nothing you could have done anyway." He added, his eyes widening when he felt the string tug a little. The crystal was beginning to pick up something.

"Let's rewind to the part about Phoebe's powers." Piper suggested, placing her palms down on the page the book was open at. "It has to be Annabelle. She's had access to the book for nearly a year. And she could have easily slipped the power stripping potion into our drinks today." She walked around the pedestal, starting to pace and sort out her thoughts, "What I don't understand is when she cast spell to seal the deal? And why weren't the baby's powers affected? Maybe she didn't take her powers. Maybe that demon was just channeling them."

Jesse, who had been sitting on the edge of the couch, shook his head, "No, Phoebe said she couldn't sense anything before she had the monition. There were around thirty or so critical patients in the A&E. Someone with her powers should have at least sensed an echo."

Lexa frowned and looked up to Jesse from her vantage point on the couch, "Um… Since when were you the expert on psionics and their powers?"

"Since I've doing this my entire life." He retorted with a hint of pride, making Lexa smirk a little.

"Well, if she really did strip Phoebe of her powers, that means that she could probably do the same to us. Paige, do you think that you could maybe whip up something to diffuse the potion in our system so the spell won't work?"

Paige bit her lip. The last thing she needed was to lose her remaining powers, "I don't think so. That potion is magic that is centuries old. And with age, comes power. I don't think I could up with something strong enough." She pursed her lips, her face turning red with embarrassment about what she was about to say, "We could… um… always just wait for nature to call."

"Aw, Paige! That's disgusting!" Piper exclaimed, going back to the book. "Although it may be our only choice…"

There was a clatter as the crystal hit the map, smacking off the wooden table beneath. Brennan's heart began to beat faster as he looked at where the amethyst had fallen. "I found him!" He breathed, "Let's go!"

"Hold it, what about the danger to our powers?" Paige asked with a fearful tone, stuffing her hands into her back pockets.

"Our nephew's life is at stake." Piper spat, appalled at Paige's sudden reluctance to save Connor, "Besides, you're half whitelighter. You won't lose _all_ your powers."

"Right…"

* * *

Annabelle knelt down so that she was at eye level with Connor. She stared into the crystal blue eyes that he had inherited from his father. They were narrowed with determination as a dome of humming electrical energy protected him from the three people in the room. The blonde gritted her teeth, retuning to her full height to grill the Krontok, "You had his shield down when you brought him in. What happened?" She growled, her eyes widening and giving her manic look.

The Krontok recoiled a little at her glare, "I don't know!" He exclaimed with a whiny voice, "I used the witch's powers to make him trust me, then his uncle busted in." He scowled, shaking his head at the memory, "The second I hit the elemental, I grabbed onto the kid and got the hell outta there before he could raise his shield."

"Oh, so you destroyed what little trust you had made with him before bringing him to us? Fantastic…" She growled, leaning in closer, "The only reason I'm not turning you into a pile of ash where you stand is because we don't have the time to find a replacement. Keep that in mind the next time you think you have a good idea…"

"What was I supposed to do? If I hadn't knocked the elemental out, he would have followed my magical trail instantly and followed me!" The Krontok protested weakly, whimpering when the lapels of his jacket where yanked on by Annabelle, before she threw him across the room, causing him to crash into one of the four brittle tables that were in the room.

"We would have taken care of the elemental!" She bellowed, striding towards him with an energy ball crackling in her palm as she raised her arm to throw it. "And we would have done it out of the boy's sight, ensuring the success of the plan. You really should have just kept your mouth shut…" The energy ball flew from her hand, hurtling towards the recovering Krontok, only for the projectile to be blown up before it reached its target. "What do you think you're doing?" Annabelle spat, whirling on Diam, who had his hand raised. He had clearly used his copied power from Piper to dispose of the energy ball.

"You said it yourself. We don't have time to find another replacement. So, get your temper in check and help me figure out how to get the kid's shield down." Diam argued calmly, lowering his hand and turning back to Connor, "Do you think he can hear us in that thing?" He murmured to his partner, frowning when a smile crossed her lips.

"No. With all the voltage in that thing, all he'll be hearing is a very loud crackle… So, if you take away the sound from that little display I just put on, what would he have made of it?" She asked him rhetorically, smirking with glee.

Diam mimicked her smirk when he caught on to what she was saying, "From his point of view, you've just thrown the demon who tried to kidnap him, across the room." He looked towards Connor, "Go for it…"

Feigning innocence, Annabelle cleared her throat as she sauntered over to the shielded four year old. She knelt down in front of them, inches from the perimeter of the shield, smiling kindly. "Connor…" She crooned gently, giving him a warm smile, "Would you please let out your shield?" She asked kindly, signaling what she meant, as she knew he probably couldn't hear her.

Seeming to be thinking the proposition over, Connor stood with a stony expression on his face, before the dome of voltage retreated into its host's body, leaving Connor unprotected from the enemies that he was unaware of, "Why is the bad demon here?" He asked with a dark frown, his suspicions rising once more as his began to radiate threatening neon blue sparks.

Annabelle looked at the child with a stern expression, before spinning her head towards the downed Krontok that lay amidst the broken wood shards of the table his flight had shattered, "You want the bad demon to go away?" She cooed, raising her arm in the evil being's direction, "Okay then…" She twisted her wrist at the Krontok, causing him to suddenly light up with a powerful amber glow, before vanishing, creating the illusion of a vanquish to someone who hadn't seen many. "That better, honey?" She asked softly, taking his hand, "I'm sorry that I had to send a demon to get you, but I didn't have any other choice…"

Connor cocked his head, "Why…?"

Her expression grew grave as bit her lip, not really knowing where was going with this, "Because…" She hesitated, "Demons are pretending to be your family so they can trick you and steal your powers. They've kidnapped everyone and are copying their powers to try and fool you. But don't worry…" She assured him, squeezing his hand tighter, "My friend Diam and I are going to get them back for you. I promise."

Before Connor could respond, a blinding flash of light erupted at the entrance to the Great Hall, forcing the three people in the room to turn their heads away from its intensity as Brennan and Lexa instantly appeared within the light. "Get the hell away from him…" Brennan growled threateningly, beginning to take a step towards Annabelle.

"Remember what I told you, Connor?" The blonde said darkly, before launching an energy ball from her hand and sending it towards the advancing mutant. Brennan, thinking fast, rose his hand, activating his third power and creating a small electrical barrier between him and the incoming attack. Both energy ball and shield cancelled each other out, vanishing in a cloud of static and leaving both combatants unharmed. "You demons are smart. Copying Brennan's and Lexa's powers certainly makes the disguise more believable." She spat, smirking a little as she moved in front of Connor.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Lexa frowned darkly, stepping forward to stand next to her friend as they both surveyed the situation with confusion.

Annabelle glowered at the molecular, "I'm not going to consort with the likes of you. The only thing a demon is good for is killing…" She spat, raising her arm again to launch another energy ball in their direction.

"Couldn't agree with you more, sweetie!" Lexa boomed proudly, pressing her palms together before pulling them apart roughly, releasing a cloud of flashing spheres that were blinding if looked into directly. Lexa, however, had adjusted to her own power, and while everyone was covering their eyes, she raised her arm, her fingers glowing with a golden light before a laser flew from them, grazing Annabelle in the arm and singing her flesh.

The dazzle began to fade away, leaving the blonde with a burn just underneath her left shoulder, "Didn't I tell you, Connor?" She said, mock fear thick in her voice, looking the boy in the eye before he turned towards his father, who was approaching him slowly.

"C'mon, buddy. Don't listen to her. Your Mom's really worried about you and she's just gonna feel worse if you don't come back with us…" He said softly, kneeling down and holding out his arms.

Connor looked at his father with a blank expression. It certainly seemed to be his actual father, was it possible Annabelle was lying to him? He turned and looked up towards the mercenary, who shot him a pleading glance. "Sorry…" He said mournfully, as he started to make his way towards Brennan. Connor suddenly stopped in his tracks, turning around with wide eyes, "No!" He shouted, his shield erupting from his chest and expanding outwards, knocking Brennan across the floor and nearly into the hallway, and hitting an invisible being on the other side, soon revealed to be Piper, as she appeared as soon as she smacked against one of the large marble pillars, hitting her head and falling unconscious before sliding to the ground.

"Okay, whoever thought sneaking up and grabbing him was a good idea…" Lexa began, helping Brennan to his feet, "… really needs to have a little rethink." She growled, seeing that with Piper's little invisibility stunt, they had destroyed whatever trust Brennan's reaching out had created.

Diam watched all this unfold from his place at the back of the hall, a sick smirk spreading across his face as he looked at the horror on Brennan's face as Annabelle walked through Connor's shield without a hint of an electrical attack coursing through her body. He was about to join her, when he noticed a puddle of water on the ground that was beginning to rise up from the floor, forming the shapes of the three people before falling away, leaving Aidan, Paige, and Jesse in its place.

"Piper!" Paige exclaimed, making a move towards her knocked out sister on the other side of the room before she and the two men she had entered with were thrown against the closest wall by a sudden wave of telekinetic energy. All three of them smacked off the marble, falling to the hard floor almost simultaneously due to the force at they had been thrown at. "You bastard…" Paige growled, seeing that it had been Diam that had attacked them with the power he had copied from her.

"Have you got us escape route?" Annabelle murmured to Diam as he stepped into the shield, marveling at the power that seemed to radiate from such a small being. He looked down and grinned at Connor's back. That power would eventually be theirs, "Diam!" Annabelle snapped, bringing him out of trance-like state.

"Oh… Yeah, I do. You're not gonna like it though…" He said in a warning tone, "What are we going to do about them?" He asked, watching as the six of them regrouped at the edge of the electric dome, not sure how to approach the situation.

Silently, the blonde raised her arm, twisting her wrist and causing the Krontok to reappear in the same dark amber light in which he had vanished. He looked around nervously, assessing his current position, "Hold them off for as long as you can!" She ordered, "Powers of the witches rise, course unseen across the skies, come to us who call you near, come to us and settle here…" She chanted darkly, smirking at the effects her spell would have.

Both Piper's and Brennan's bodies glowed with a ghostly white for a moment, before streams of swirling lights flew from their chests, stripping them of their powers. Paige, thinking fast, wildly threw out her arm, telekinetically sending one cloud of lights spiraling off direction before flying out of one of the many broken windows in the hall. Unfortunately, the powers that were left flew straight into the Krontok's body, imbuing him with whatever powers Paige hadn't managed to divert.

"Okay, here we go…" Diam said softly, gesturing to the wall hopefully. A pulse of blue energy erupted from his hand, colliding with the wall and immediately opening a terrifying, murky grey portal that sucked in two of the chairs that had been sitting at the wall.

Annabelle scooped the child up into her arms, the shield moving with him as the three of them moved towards the portal. "See you around…" She said with a wink, turning her back to the group and stepping into the mass of swirling grey, vanishing in a deep purple glow with her allies.

"Paige! Orb him to us!" Piper screeched, watching as Connor began to disappear into the portal.

The witchlighter bit her lips, scrunching up her eyes, "I… can't!" She finally confessed, hanging her head in shame as her shoulders drooped, all her confidence draining from her body as Connor faded away into the grey on the wall.

"No!" Brennan bellowed, starting to make his way towards the portal, only to be thwarted when an explosion struck him in the chest, throwing him back into Paige and Jesse and knocking them to the ground bowling pins. He recovered quickly, seeing that the Krontok had used Piper's powers to repel him from the wall, and decided to tackle the demon to the floor. The mutant let out a roar as he lunged at the evil being, only for criss-crossing orange lines to spread over his body as he massed out. The effect was like running straight into a brick wall and Brennan hit the floor, blood seeping from his left temple as he fell unconscious.

"I guess that solves the mystery of whose powers he got…" Jesse murmured softly to himself as they gathered around Brennan, helping him up off the floor just as the Krontok vanished into the portal, the gateway itself closing in a harsh blue flash.

* * *

Pamela clamped a hand over her mouth as she yawned. She was never one for the superstitions, but for some reason, the one about the devil getting in if you didn't cover your mouth during a yawn had always stuck with her. She looked at her watch, shaking her head at the fact she was up at six thirty in the morning on a Saturday. She had woke up an hour earlier and just couldn't get back to sleep, so she decided to get up, have a shower, and make the most of her day.

She moved into the kitchen, beginning to make a pot of coffee as she knew the sound of the New York traffic would mean that Jordann as going to wake up soon thanks to her enhanced hearing. She was about to reach up for a mug, when a bright light suddenly flew past her eyesight. Taken aback, the witch threw her hand up to her head, accidentally smacking herself in the face, "Ow…" She groaned, shaking off the feeling that she was needed somewhere.

It happened again, but this time, she saw a swirl of lights race up the arm that was reaching for a mug. She quickly pulled it back, looking down at it and frowning. The feeling that she was needed got stronger. An odd sensation ran up her spine and coursed through her body, and Pamela realized what she was experiencing. White lights swarmed around her as she was summoned by another witch, illuminating the dark kitchen in an angelic glow while the tornado grew faster, "Aw… shi-," There was a flash, and she was gone.

* * *

"Ow!" Brennan winced as Lexa pressed a damp cloth against the gash in his temple. The mutant recoiled and jerked his head away from her, glaring at her, "You're a little rough, aren't you?" He asked rhetorically, cautiously raising his hand up to his wound, tapping it slightly.

"And you're a little whiny." Lexa retorted, grabbing his shoulder and pulling him back, "You're no good to your son if you're stuck with double vision, are you?" She spat, gripping his shoulder tightly to make sure he didn't move away from her this time as she pressed the cloth against the wound, rolling her eyes when Brennan grimaced in pain, "Stop being a baby. How the hell does Phoebe put up with you? She's going through the biggest agony a woman can go though, stoically I might add, and you're sitting here throwing a tantrum about a little cut."

Brennan stayed silent, choosing to fist the cushion that was underneath his tightening fist, "I'm no good to my son. Period. I couldn't even save him from those bastards… And now we can't even get to him. Some parent I am… Ow!" He exclaimed again as Lexa brought the wet cloth to his face a little too quickly slapping him with it.

"Oh, God, I'm sorry," She said with as much insincerity as she could muster, "Did that feel like the cold slap of reality? Look, Bren, you know I like to bust your chops over every little thing, but one thing I'm not going to criticize is your parenting. You're a good father, and a good husband, although the latter escapes me… And they're not going to hurt Connor. They need him." She said, shaking her head with a sigh, "There. All done!" She cheered, putting down the cloth, "Do you want a band aid with a teddy bear on it, or are you good?" She smirked.

Brennan managed to give her a chuckle, "Nah, I'm good." He stood up and put his hands into his back pockets, not sure how to say what he wanted, "Um… Thanks, Lex." He said uncomfortably, before walking away towards where the portal had opened, placing a hand on her shoulder as he passed.

"Any time."

Jesse watched in amazement as Paige just stood in front of the wall, her eyes glowing with a brilliant golden light as she used her powers to scan over the area where the portal had been, "Um… What is she doing?" He murmured curiously to Aidan, who was also watching as his wife

"She's looking onto the Shadow Plane." He explained simply, "It's where things that aren't visible to the human eye are, well, visible. Paige will be able to see if there's any magical residue she and her sister can use to open the portal again."

The mutant took in this new information, marveling once again at the wonders magic seemed to keep putting in front of his face. He turned his head, watching as Piper helped Brennan call for his powers, after they had been thrown out of the window and therefore saved, by Paige. "You know, magic really does fascinate me…" He breathed, gazing at the cloud of swirling lights that flew in through the window and went straight to Brennan, restoring his abilities.

Aidan could only laugh, "I always forget how weird our everyday lives must seem to someone who isn't really used to magic." He mused, "I mean, I know that you've had your powers all your life, but stuff like creating portals through time and space, vanquishing demons… I've been around this stuff all my life, so I can understand why it probably fascinates you."

"I don't think it's that." Jesse replied, folding his arms, "I think it's maybe just because I've been a man of science my entire life. Everything has a rational and reasonable explanation. Everything has a purpose… Magic just seems to disprove all of that. I mean, I know it has its rules, but it's basically limitless." He frowned at Aidan's amused expression, "What…?"

"You definitely are a man of science." Aidan said, turning back to Paige, "I've never seen anyone put so much into magic!"

Piper carefully approached her youngest sister as the glow in her eyes faded away and she came back to her normal sight, "Did you see anything that we can use?" The eldest witch asked, recoiling a little then Paige jumped in surprise and spun around on her heel at an amazing speed.

"Um… Yeah, it's faint, but I think we can use it somehow." She said, looking at Piper as she stared down at the floor with her hands in her pockets, "Okay, just get it over with. Yell at me. I know you want to. I was stupid to lose my whitelighter powers…" She began, stopping when Piper shot her a kind smile.

"I'm not mad at you… Okay, maybe a little, but not because you lost your powers, it's because you felt that you couldn't tell us." She explained.

"Well, you guys have going through hell recently." Paige began, "Phoebe's pregnancy, you with Leo and the restaurant… The last thing I wanted to do was cause you more stress by basically saying you were the only Charmed One in full operation. I'm sorry." She said sadly, lowering her head a little. "I'm really surprised you're not angry…"

Piper shrugged, "Paige, how can I be mad at you? If you had lost them in some personal gain freak out, then yeah, I would have probably gone ballistic. But you saved a dying man. A dying man who is very important to our niece. It's those idiots up there that are in the wrong, so don't worry about it. Really, I'm fine."

Paige smiled in return, feeling as if a large weight had just been taken off her shoulders, "Great…" She murmured with a grin, before getting back to the issue at hand, "So, any ideas how we're going to reopen the portal. I mean, it's gonna be pretty hard without the Power of Three."

"I've thought about that…" Piper said with a sing song voice, walking towards the wall and placing her right hand on the surface, "There was a spell me and Phoebe used to go after you that time the Leaper Demon sent you to another dimension. You know, when you had your little princess phase?" She reminded her with a smirk.

Paige shot her a playful glare in return, "Let's do it…" She said calmly, before her eyes widened, "Oh my God! The kids! We've left them in that hospital kids area. They'll be worried about us, and Phoebe!"

Piper raised a hand in return, "Don't worry about it. That kids area is prepared for children staying overnight, and Wyatt knows who to call if there's any trouble…" She said, pursing her lips to suppress her laughter at what she had told her eldest son to do in case of emergency. "C'mon, let's go before Brennan starts up again about leaving Phoebe alone."

"Isn't she alone though?"

"No, she isn't."

* * *

"Oh my God…"

Piper took in her new surroundings with a horrible sinking feeling of horror in her heart. It was a wasteland. All she could see was wreckage from various things that she couldn't even recognize, but if she had to hazard a guess, she'd say they were parts of buildings. Any bare ground she found was cracked, dusty, and dry to the bone, as if it hadn't rained in years. Something wasn't right about this place.

She looked up, taking in a breath and realizing just how thick the air was. It had probably been laced with dust from the ground, and whatever small particles had got into the air from the wreckage that surrounded her, not to mention the thick smoke that caused a haze in front of her, blocking her view. She couldn't even tell if the sky was just cloudy, or smoky, and if she hadn't known any better, she would have thought she was in Hell.

"What the hell is this place…?" Lexa murmured, barely managing to get a sentence out before coughing and spluttering on the barely sustainable air that was now flooding her lungs.

Everyone else seemed to be just as confused as she was. No one ventured out from the tight group they had knitted. They all just looked around at the lack of life in this baron land. It was the most depressing place Piper had ever seen in her entire life.

Something caught her eye to her right and she turned around, seeing something that didn't fit in with the consistent grey that seemed to run through this world. It was a pale pink colour, nearly white. Her heart began to pound as she realized what it was, and before she knew it, her feet were bringing her closer and closer to it. A human hand was in the rubble.

Piper began to grab pieces of wreckage and throw them off where she thought the body was. She would lay her hands on a piece and throw it in any direction. It didn't seem to matter in this… dead world. An arm was slowly revealed as the rubble was moved, then a torso. Without even thinking, Piper grabbed the piece of corrugated metal that lay over where the head should be, dropping it before she even had to a chance to throw it away and gasping in shock and horror, backing away with her hand over her mouth and staring at the face in wreckage.

"Piper what is it?" Paige asked from behind her. The five of them had only stood back and watched Piper's feverish search through the rubble.

"It's… me."

**TO BE CONTINUED…**


	18. Keep The Faith, Baby Part II

**Keep The Faith, Baby: Part 2**

The doctor screamed as the explosion tore through him like a hot knife through butter. He burst into flames and was swallowed in a vicious gout of fire that nearly reached the ceiling of the small room, before he blew up in a shower of red sparks that left small burn marks on the sheet on Phoebe's bed. There was a small clink as the athame that had been in his hand hit the clean floor. Phoebe looked and breathed a sigh of relief, "I love it when they clean up after themselves…" She murmured, grateful that the demon hadn't left a pile of ash which would cause questions. "Thanks, Pam."

"No problem." The witch replied, lowering her hands from the blasting position, "I can't believe it. That's the third demon doctor that's tried to come at you today. Does my little cousin want to fire herself out your uterus anytime soon? Because this is getting old." She groaned, walking around the bed and picking up the athame, sliding it down the back of her jeans and under her jacket so she could pull it out quickly if needed.

The door opened and a redheaded nurse poked her head into the room, looking around with uneasy curiosity, "Is everything okay in here? That was a pretty loud scream I just heard." She said, walking into the room to inspect it, not noticing that Pamela seemed to be gripping something behind her back.

"Um… Yeah, everything's fine. My aunt just had a really painful contraction." She said with a smile that couldn't have been more fake if she had tried, "It's okay, Auntie Phoebe!" She said brightly, stroking Phoebe's hair a little, "Really, we're fine."

"Are you sure? Because I could have sworn it was a man screaming…" The nurse trailed off, looking around, "Didn't a doctor just come in here?" She asked, vaguely remembering someone entering this room from her spot at the nurse's station.

Pamela looked around, feigning ignorance of the situation, "Nope, no doctor in here!" She joked, plastering another smile onto her face, "And… uh… My aunt just has a really deep voice, almost manly! So that's probably what you heard." She lied, trailing off into a near whisper at the end.

"Alright. I'll be down the hall if you need me." She said kindly, turning on her heel and heading towards the door, giving the two women a suspicious glance as she left.

The moment she left, Phoebe let out a tired sigh as her head drooped to her chest, "I can't do this anymore, Pam. I've been at it for twelve hours and they still say that I'm not ready…" She said, just above a whisper, as she was afraid if she talked normally, she would break down, "My son has been kidnapped by demons, my husband and sisters are God knows where trying to find him, and I'm going through the labour from Hell!" She screeched, wincing as another contraction hit her, "This… is… _ridiculous_!"

"I know, sweetie." Pamela said soothingly, taking her aunt's hand, and instantly regretting it as Phoebe clamped down on it so hard she had to fight back the urge to scream, "But Connor is going to be fine. Brennan's hardly alone; he's got Piper, Paige… And you have me!"

Phoebe managed to let out a small chuckle, "Yeah, I'm so glad Wyatt summoned you. I couldn't imagine doing this alone… Especially since they're now talking now a c-section. I mean, could this day be any more of a disaster?" She asked wearily, her head flopping back onto the pillow.

Pamela bit her lip, choosing to go for the silent type of comfort, as she was afraid of telling her aunt what her answer to the question was. It was now, more than ever that Pamela was glad that her aunt was disempowered at this particular moment, as only one reply was screaming in her head right now.

_Yes!

* * *

_

"This was your idea of an escape?" Annabelle spat as she looked around the place they had stopped. "If anything, this is more dangerous than staying behind to fight with the…" She trailed off, noticing Connor looking up at her curiously, "_Demonic_ Charmed Ones…" She corrected, "Although the latter may end up being inevitable since you know they're going to follow us here…" She said, pacing around in a circle with her hands on her hip, "And you…" She growled loudly, turning towards the Krontok, "I said you were to hold them off as long as you could. What part of that did you take to mean that you were to scuttle through the portal after one attack?"

"There were six of them! And four of them still had powers. I thought you had given the potion to all them." He argued back with a dark frown, clearly getting a little tired of how he was being treated.

"I didn't know the mutants were going to make appearance, and I never had the chance to spike Paige and Aidan's drinks. I was too busy trying to tie up a loose end for most of the day." She explained, a dark tone in her voice, showing that this loose end was a lot more than she was making it out to be.

"Would you put a sock in it, please?" Diam snapped, getting up from his kneeling position in front of Connor, "Look, like it or not, this was the best place I could get us to in such short notice. Would rather we be roasting our heels in some hell dimension?" He asked rhetorically, getting his answer when Annabelle fell silent, folding her arms. "Okay, can we just do the damn spell now?" His voice dropped so that the child standing behind him wouldn't hear, "Moving around with this kid is getting me a little jumpy."

"This whole place gets me jumpy. But in a good way." Annabelle smirked, looking out towards the baron wasteland that spread out in front of her. The air was thick the souls of the people that had lost their lives. And she knew there were a lot of them, "Connor…" She began, putting on a kind exterior, "I want you to take my hand, and Diam's, so we can say a little spell. Is that okay?"

"What's the spell do?" He asked with a suspicious frown. These people had pulled him through a portal, and they had arrived at a place that sent a chill down Connor's spine every few seconds. He didn't like this.

"It's… going to bring a very special thing to us." She explained as cryptically yet simply as she could, "C'mon. Once we get this special thing, we can go and your parents and the rest of your family again. You want to see them again, don't you?" He nodded immediately with a stony expression, his mind trying to piece together a bad feeling he had in his heart, "Okay then." Annabelle stood up and turned to Diam, "We're ready."

Keeping his face blank, Diam hid his glee at this news and held out his hand, taking Connor's significantly smaller one in his as Annabelle held the other one so that the child was in the middle. The two beings looked at each other and nodded slowly, before looking forward and beginning to chant, "Eternus, res exorior, perussi quicumque, eram quod fio, quis est!"

A supernatural wind blew around the three of them. For some reason, it felt deader than anything in this wasteland yet. It felt ancient, powerful, and empty. Connor closed his eyes as his long hair flew around his face, going in his eyes now and again. A beacon of light suddenly ignited a few feet in front of them, floating above the ground as it pulsed, setting off a powerful flash of light every second. It continued to do this. Annabelle and Diam watched in amazement as the flashes began to come closer together, before they were going so fast it seemed like the beacon was shining constantly. There was an echoing screech before one last blinding flash, and it was gone.

"Where is it?" Annabelle asked feverishly, her eyes darting around the ground for any of sign of the spell working.

Diam joined her in the crazed search of the area, before he groaned and turned away, putting his hands on the sides of this bald head. "We don't have enough power to bring it forth. At least not through time and space. I knew we should have taken the twins…" He growled, thinking that the two of them would have probably had a lot more power than Connor.

"Can't we just use him?" Annabelle shot a dirty look at the Krontok, "He's got Charmed power in him. That would be more than enough energy. Even if it's just two of them." She argued.

He shook his head in response, "Their individual powers mean nothing. They've retained their core witch powers, which means they're still the Charmed Ones, the other abilities are just bonuses." Diam took in a deep breath turning on his heel, giving Connor a dark look before glancing at Annabelle, "I'll be back…" He said, before he became a blur, moving away from the scene at unimaginable speed.

* * *

Paige stood atop a pile of rubble, her eyes glowing with a golden glow as she looked out into the distance. Her bottom lip quivered as a silent tear trickled down from her left eye. Anyone looking at her right now would have probably thought the sight to be incredibly odd with the unnatural glow in her eyes. Shaking her head, the witchlighter's eyes returned to normal and she turned around, only to be faced with Piper, "Whoa! You scared me!" She exclaimed, quickly wiping her face of any tears.

"Sorry…" Piper said airily, walking towards her youngest sister with her arms folded, "You know, you keep doing that every time we stop for a break." She announced. They had had to take breaks every few hours of walking, as, for some reason, Lexa seemed to be finding it hard to breathe in this world. The air was certainly thick, but it only seemed to affect her in this way, "What do you see?"

Paige bit her lip, before rolling her eyes and holding out her hand, "Take it and I'll show you…" She said sadly, gripping Piper's hand tightly in her own and pulling her up to the knoll she was standing on. "You don't need to look in any particular direction; you'll know what I mean."

Before Piper could even respond, her sigh was suddenly changed. The bleak wasteland was suddenly alive with colours streaming from the ground, rising into the air and bursting into tiny sparkling particles that seemed to join the glowing haze was set across the land. It was almost blinding. Piper's eyes began to hurt the moment Paige stopped sharing her MDS, not used to the transition. "Damn! Do your eyes always feel like they've been doused in salt after that?" She pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes, before bringing her head up, looking at her younger sister, "What the hell was all that?"

"Souls." Paige replied simply yet gravely, kneeling down on the ground and brushing the dirt a little with her slender fingers, "I don't know where we are. But so many have died, and they're bound to this land, they're making the air thick with…" She stuttered when she tried to think of the right word to describe the phenomenon.

"Death?" Piper chimed in just above a whisper, her expression unreadable.

"… Yeah." Paige sighed, bringing herself up to her feet, "I've been performing a relinquishment ritual every time we've stopped so far. I think it's helped a lot of the souls move on, and as soon as I do it, Lexa seems to recover from her shortness of breath. Do you want to help me this time? We might end up helping some more people."

"Okay…" Piper replied reluctantly, walking closer to her sister and taking her hand, "You wouldn't happen to know if you released my soul, would you?" Paige gave her an odd expression, "I mean the me back there… You know, the dead one?" She said quietly, clearly still unnerved by the sight of her own corpse a few hours back.

Paige bit her lip, not really knowing how to respond, "Piper, you know how this ritual works. I cast it on the area, so yeah… your other self's soul was probably released." She held out her hand again, "Let's do this…"

Brennan paced impatiently back and forth over the same patch of ground, his heavy steps causing a mini dust storm at his ankles. "This is supposed to be a rescue mission, you guys!" He suddenly shouted, "Instead, we have you two…" He gestured at Piper and Paige as they turned around from the small hill they were on, "… casting spells every chance you can, and you…" He turned on Lexa, who was just beginning to rise to her feet, "What's your problem? I know you've been in worse places than this. What's wrong?"

"I'm just feeling a little short of breath! Alright?" Lexa snapped in response, stumbling a bit as stood to her full height. She was ready to burst into another slur of comebacks, before her eyes shifted from Brennan to something she saw out the corner of her eye, "I think we have a little bit of a problem on our hands…" She breathed, making everyone turn around to see Diam standing cockily on the top of a large mound of rubble.

"You guys miss me during my absence?" Diam smirked, bending down and picking up a small pebble, throwing it up and down in his hand casually as the group surveyed him with fear.

"Still alive, I see." Piper spat back, putting a hand on Paige's forearm for Charmed support if it was needed.

He cocked his head in return, "That's a lot more than I can say for your husband."

"Shut up…" She retorted darkly, resisting the urge to raise her hands and blast him off his arrogant perch, knowing that they really shouldn't start a battle with him unless it was in self defense.

Brennan, however, exercised less self control than his in law. "Where's Connor, you son of a bitch?" He growled, holding out his hands and igniting a flurry of sizzling sparks that flew from his fingertips. He was ready to hurl two tesla coils towards the being, when Aidan put a hand on his shoulder and shook his head, signaling not to lose his temper.

"What do you want?" The elemental growled, glancing down at Brennan's hands at the sparks diffused from his hands.

"You two." He bluntly replied, pointing towards Piper and Paige, "In exchange for the safety of the boy of course. I know I would never get something for nothing from you girls," He smirked, slightly enjoying the loathing he could feel from the six of them at this moment in time.

Jesse let out a chuckle before slowly shaking his head, "A promise from you means nothing. You've probably got Annabelle waiting in the wings somewhere, ready to strike if we don't go along with your plan."

Diam smiled wryly, licking his lips, "Trust me, if she knew I was doing this, she'd have stopped me in about three seconds flat…"

"But like Jesse said…" Piper began, taking Paige's and walking forward, "Your promise means nothing. Give us Connor back and then we'll come with you." She offered, ignoring the panicky squeeze her hand got from her younger sister at the idea, "Look, you obviously need us for something, otherwise you wouldn't even be here."

"Must be something that requires true Charmed power too." Paige chipped in, catching to Piper's plan and gaining more confidence, "Otherwise you could have used Piper's and Phoebe's powers from your demon friend to do it."

For once, Diam didn't have a cocky comeback, "You girls drive a hard bargain…" He said lowly, biting his lip before eventually nodding his head, "Alright then…" He relented, turning away from them and beginning to walk away, "Follow me."

"Okay." Paige said, slyly putting her hand into her back pocket, "There's just one more thing…" Her arm suddenly whipped out from her back, a coal black potion spinning through the air and smashing on Diam's back. The moment the vial cracked, there was a terrible moan, before a stretching white light flew from the potion and towards the sky, vanishing. There was a small grunt from Diam, before he hit the ground with an undignified thud.

"What the hell was that?" Piper shrieked, not having even expected such a rash move from her sibling.

Paige began to walk towards the down being, shrugging a little, "A potion. Brewed with the blood of a dead man." She explained with a grim tone, "If made correctly, it has a stunning effect on any magical creature." She turned to the group, smirking a little. "At least we know he's magical."

"What are you doing?" Brennan roared, striding towards Paige in such a menacing manner that made Aidan protectively stand by his wife's side, "He was about to take us to Connor! What the hell are we supposed to do now?"

"We make him talk. He's in no position to argue," Paige replied, kicking Diam in the stomach to turn him over onto his back, showing that he was barely conscious. "I have three more vials of that stuff if it starts to ware off, so we get him to lead us back to Connor, and if that conflicts with where your little sixth sense thing is leading us, we'll go with yours. Happy?" She said, raising an eyebrow in Brennan's direction.

Brennan stood silent for a few seconds before replying, "Fine…" He mumbled, "How are we going to carry him though?"

Without even a twitch from Paige, Diam suddenly flew into the air, telekinetically suspended just a few inches from the ground with his head drooped down to his chest. The witchlighter looked back, smirking at her work, "All with the power of the mind." She said proudly, turning to Brennan, "Okay, which direction?"

"Um…" The mutant did a full turn, before pointing in one way, "Let's go." He announced, leading the rest of the group in that direction as they began to clamber over the large mound of rubble that was obstructing their path.

Piper held back with Paige for a few moments, "I don't even want to know where you got the blood of a dead man…" She whispered, a shiver going down her spine at the scenarios that were running through her head.

"Good." Paige replied, pursing her lips, "Because I don't even want to tell you."

* * *

Pamela took a deep breath as she went to open the door to yet another room. She turned the knob, pushing it open, only to find the ninth empty room she had been in empty. The bed was perfectly made, as if no one had slept in it in ages. In fact, it looked as if this room had never even been used in its existence. This whole situation just got weirder with each step. In every room she had looked into on this floor, they had been empty. Yet she could still hear the sounds of a busy hospital. Something wasn't right.

She could feel someone's glare burning into the back of her head. Pamela turned around, only to have all the nurses at the nurses' station down the corridor look down at whatever they had been doing before staring at the back of her head, "Welcome to Kingdom Hospital…" She groaned to herself, before plastering on a smile and heading towards the nurses' station.

"Can I help you, miss? Is your aunt okay?" The same redheaded nurse from earlier asked her with a large smile that made Pamela feel a little uneasy.

"Oh, don't worry. She's fine. She loves all the attention she's getting. Mind you, since she seems to be the only person in the ward, I can't really blame you for doting on one person." She replied, noting the shift in mood as her statement as every nurse seemed to stop what they were doing.

"Yeah, well, I guess it's just a slow baby day!" The nurse replied cheerily, "It happens every few months." She continued, not giving Pamela eye contact as she did.

"Really?" The witch inquired further, "Because I saw quite a lot of people in earlier, and they can't have all had their babies this quickly." She added, putting a smile at the end of her sentence to try and cover up the fact she was probing.

The woman shrugged, going back to filing while other nurses listened in intently, "Well, I only came in at lunch. I'm assuming whoever hasn't delivered yet was probably moved to another ward…" She said warily, "You should probably get back to your aunt. She'll be worrying about her."

"Yeah…" Pamela replied distantly, thinking of something, "I think I'll do just that." She spun on her heel, her hair flying to the other shoulder from the force of her turn as she strode back towards the room………

Phoebe tossed uncomfortably in her bed, fisting the sheets from the pain that was wracking her body. It was now six in the evening, and she had passed her fatigue barrier hours ago. She couldn't get any sleep, due to the pain and the worry she had for her son, and she couldn't relax either. The last fifteen hours had been absolute hell. The door opened and her head shot up, hoping it was Brennan with Connor, only to have her hopes dashed when Pamela reentered, "Did you find anything out?"

"Um… no. Sorry." She replied apologetically, frowning a little at Phoebe's expression, "Not who you were expecting?" She asked, stroking Phoebe's hair away from her clammy face.

"No… I just want this to be o-," Phoebe cut herself off, noticing an abnormal silvery glimmer pass over Pamela's eyes, "Hey, sweetie, could you maybe pass me that towel over there?" She asked sweetly as her right arm reached out to her side, where her hand curled around the handle of a glass water pitcher as Pamela turned around.

"Alri-," The moment she turned back around with the towel in hand, Phoebe summoned all her remaining strength, wrenching the pitcher from the nightstand and bringing it down on the doppelganger's head. Water flew everywhere as the glass smashed, mixing with the blood that had been spilled from the head wound on the demon as she fell to the floor, still managing to keep up Pamela's guise in an unconscious state.

After a large amount of struggling, Phoebe got up from the bed, trying to ignore the agonizing pain that came with each step towards the door. She opened it, stepping out into the hall before a shooting pain flew up her spine, causing her to let out a yelp as she collapsed to her knees, sliding down the doorframe as she held onto it for dear life.

"What the hell?" The redheaded nurse gasped as she neared the room, making her way to it after hearing the crash of the water pitcher.

The shapeshifter, still appearing as Pamela, appeared from the room, blood gushing from her head as she winced, "You're the feisty one. I'll give you that…" She growled with sick delight at Phoebe, who was only able to glare back from the floor. "Put her to sleep until she's ready for surgery. Her family is too caught up with Diam, so we don't have to worry about them."

"What about her?" The nurse asked darkly, nodding towards the real Pamela, who lay unconscious on the floor at the top of the corridor, a few of the stronger nurses dragging her limp body away from Phoebe's sight.

"Tie her up, draw the binding glyph on her hand, and stuff her in a closet." The shapeshifter ordered, looking down and letting out a small chuckle as she watched Phoebe try to get back to her feet, only to slide down the doorway once again, "You really shouldn't have tried a crappy escape like that. You could've hurt your baby." She knelt down, looking into Phoebe's eyes, "Don't worry, the pain's going to be over soon. Well, the physical side of it at least. Because the next time you wake up, your baby's going to be gone."

Phoebe gritted her teeth, glowering into the shapeshifter's shimming silver eyes, before gathering as much saliva as she could in her mouth and spitting in her face, "They… will… come for me." She threatened, her tone just above a whisper as that was all she could manage, "And they'll… vanquish… your… sorry ass."

The shapeshifter seemed to blink in surprise, wiping her face with her sleeve, before returning to her true height and standing up, "Now, there's absolutely no need to be rude." She growled, bringing the back of her hand down on Phoebe's cheek, causing her head to collide with the doorframe and nearly rendering her unconscious. "Get her cleaned up." She spat to one of the nurses. "The real doctors will be performing the c-section and I don't want them asking questions about her injuries."

Phoebe didn't even have the strength the protest as two nurses lifted up her arms and began to carry her down the hall. Her head drooped to her chest, tasting the metallic tang of her own blood as it trickled from her temple and curved around her sweaty face, "Brennan…"

* * *

"Hey, Paige, he's starting to sober up a little. Should we give him another potion?" Piper suggested, watching as Diam seemed to become more alert and aware of his surroundings, and the fact that he was being carried by an unseen force that had restricted his movement. "Because I'd rather avoid any battles with him if possible." She said, backing away a little as Paige walked towards her strung up prisoner.

She pulled out another coal black vial from her pocket, waving it in front of his face in a taunting manner, "Look, this is pretty much a hopeless situation for you, as the moment you start to actually get your senses back, I just crack another one of these babies at your feet and your lights go out again." She explained coldly, cocking her head slightly, "So, here's the deal, if you answer our questions, we'll just keep throwing these at you instead of actually vanquishing you."

Even in his drowsy state, Diam managed to let out a patronizing chuckle, "You're… bluffing…" He said hoarsely, his voice out of practice after having not spoken for hours.

"Do you want to take that chance?" Piper added confidently with her hands on her hips, standing next to Paige and giving Diam the same arrogant stare her sister was giving. "Something tells me you'd rather be unconscious than dead, but, you know, if you prefer the latter…" She trailed off, going into her pocket, pretending to be on the verge of revealing something lethal.

"What do you want… to know…?" He grumbled as Piper's hand was coming out of the pocket, buying their lie.

Piper and Paige looked at each other. Both of them had dreamed for an opportunity like this with one of their enemies, but now the time was upon them, they didn't even know what they wanted to ask. The two of them stuttered for a few seconds, clearly overwhelmed by the amount of mysteries that surrounded this situation.

"What are you?" Aidan eventually asked, silencing everyone as they held their breath, waiting for the answer.

Diam stayed silent until Paige flicked him on the shoulder, eliciting a response, "I am… infinite… Existed since… the beginning of magic…" He breathed, "Took the strongest… of both sides… to just seal… us away…" A sick smile spread across his face as he began to speak again, "And we… awaken… to finish what… what… we started."

"What would that be exactly?" Piper questioned in monotone, her gaze set lazily on Diam as he began to respond.

"Haven't you… figured it out… yet…?" He asked, before letting out a weak laugh, "Humans… so stupid…" He mused to himself, before beginning to answer Piper's question, "To… return everything… to the empty world… To start… anew, with no… magic… no humans… no demons… nothing."

Jesse mulled over the most recent statement, before the colour drained from his features as a feeling of dread spread over his face. He walked up to the being, frowning with confusion and disbelief, "Are we… in the future?" He whispered, his eyes wide with desperation for the answer to his question.

One of the most chilling booms of laughter came from Diam's chest, his strength gradually returning, "Well done…" He replied gruffly, managing to bring his head up and grin gleefully at Jesse, who recoiled in horror at the answer, along with Paige and Piper.

"Alright, I've had enough of this…" Brennan growled, pushing past the three people the grabbing Diam by the throat. "Why did you take Connor? What the hell does he have to do with any of this?" He shouted, shaking the being vigorously, "He's just a kid!" He bellowed again, the pressure of losing his son finally starting to break him down at his eyes began to well up.

"You guys, I think you should throw the potion." Lexa gently advised, glancing at Brennan as she did, "He's just gaining more strength as we ask him questions and we can't have him get back to full power or he'll get away and take Connor with him." She knew that last part would get Brennan to let go. He did, bringing his hand down to his side once more and stepping as Paige hurled the potion at Diam's chest. It had the same effect as last time; a stretching white light flew into the sky as his head drooped back to his chest, stunning him again.

"C'mon." Brennan said quietly, turning away from the enemy that was suspended in the air telekinetically, "It's not far now…"

* * *

Pamela opened her eyes, only to be greeted with further darkness. Fear spread through her body as she thought she had gone blind, before her eyes adjusted and she could make out the vague shapes of shelves on the sides of the small room. She tried to open her mouth, only to find that it had been sealed with a piece of duck tape, while her hands had been tied behind her back. She decided that this was the most humiliating situation she had ever been in. Humiliating, but not impossible to escape from. She wiggled her fingers, trying to telekinetically undo the rope around her wrists before rolling her eyes at her own stupidity. Demons wouldn't have tried to trap her like this without disabling her powers somehow. It didn't matter though, she would still get free.

Rolling onto her back, she threw her legs up into the air, throwing them forward and propelling herself into a crouching position, before struggling to her full height. At first, she went towards the door, bumping the wall around it, looking for a light switch. Her prayers were answered when a small bulb flickered to life on the ceiling, illuminating the tiny storage cupboard and revealing two waist level shelves on the walls. Moving her arms up her back, she hiked up her jacket, pulling out the athame she had hidden down the back of her jeans earlier and beginning to cut through the rope. She let out a small laugh when she felt the rope loosen. They really should have used thicker rope.

It was only a matter of time before she had cut through her restrains, the rope falling to the floor as she put the athame back into her jeans and ripped the duck tape off her mouth, wincing immediately as her eyes widened with pain, "Ow…!" She hissed to herself, "That was a lip wax I didn't want! … or need." She was a about to turn around and tackle the door, before a column of bright white and blue lights descended from the ceiling, depositing a plump, auburn haired woman that Pamela recognized instantly, "Mrs. Hunter…?"

"Yes, dear." She replied, raising a finger to her lips, "Keep your voice down. There are two of them outside." She let out a tutting noise at Pamela's shocked expression, "Oh, for God's sake. Get over it already! We don't have much time. That pattern on your hand…" She pointed down to the intricate symbol drawn on the back of Pamela's left hand, "… is a binding glyph. So here…" She pulled out a moist cloth from her pocket and handed it to the witch, "Rub that off!"

"You're… a whitelighter?" Pamela breathed, looking the woman up and down as she started to rub the glyph off of her hand.

"Connor's specifically." She replied, before looking up at the ceiling and rethinking her answer, "And of course, the new baby's. Who is in serious danger unless you get a move on and Brennan gets back here!" She put her hands on her hips, "Now, the demons have a created a phantom level to the hospital. You and Phoebe were transported there in the morning. Right now, the doctors operating on her have also been brought here. They're oblivious to the fact that the entire staff is made up of demons. You're going to need to vanquish all of the demons and this level will collapse, returning you to where you're supposed to be."

Pamela just raised an eyebrow, trying to process the information that had come at her, "All the bad guys. Got it." She summed it up into, putting up tow thumbs of approval and turning towards the door.

"Okay. I'll be hovering in the ether to bail you out of trouble if you need it. Oh, and Pam…" She laid a hand on the witch's shoulder, turning her around to face her, "Don't tell Phoebe and Brennan who I really am. I only intervened to save the baby, and now that that's done, I should go back to being the nosy neighbour."

"Alright… and thank you."

* * *

The two demons frowned as the door to the storage closet began to rattle. They exchanged looks, silently trying to decide who would be the one to open the door. Eventually, one of them took the plunge, placing their hand on the knob and turning it, only for the door to be blasted off its hinges, sending the demon flying across to the other side of the hall, smashing into the wall from the force of the telekinetic wave.

The remaining demon felt a tap on his shoulder. He turned around, only to have Pamela blow a cloud of cryokinetic energy in his face, encasing his head in ice and allowing her to shatter it with just her fist. The demon's body hit the floor, bursting into flames and vanishing shortly afterwards, leaving no trace of his existence.

The evil being that had been pinned to the wall by the door threw it off his body, rising to his feet and hurling a fireball in Pamela's direction. She raised her hand, redirecting it with just the power of her mind and making it collide with the demon's shoulder, before using her other hand in a quick gesture that blew him up instantly.

"Onwards and upwards…" She breathed, before striding down the corridor towards where her aunt was being held.

* * *

Annabelle had been pacing over the same area of dirt for the last two hours. Connor had fallen asleep hours ago, and Diam still hadn't returned. She didn't know what he had been planning when he left, but if it was taking him this long to get back, it couldn't be good news. She looked up, glaring at the Krontok demon who she had charged to keep watch for her partner. "You see anything?" She hissed, careful not to wake up the sleeping child.

"No. Do you think he's dead?" The demon replied, "I mean, even without the third, the Charmed Ones are really power-,"

"He wouldn't have been killed by them. At the end of the day, they're just three witches that are a cut above the commoners. The last time one of us was vanquished was three hundred years ago, and I won't let that happen again." She growled, continuing to pace and combing a hand through her blonde locks.

"Wait…" The Krontok whispered, "There's-," There was a sudden flash of light, before the demon was thrown until into the pit by a powerful tesla coil that struck him in the chest.

Brennan leapt into Annabelle's sight, hurling another streak of lightning in the blonde's direction that hit her in the chest, hurling her into the air before she smacked the ground with a loud thud that awoke Connor from his slumber. "Annie…?" He murmured, seeing the burn just underneath her collarbone and raising a dome of electrical energy, protecting both him and his 'captor'.

The rest of the group came over the hill, sighing with relief when they saw Connor, before losing their confidence when they saw that he had raised his shield to protect Annabelle once again. "Bren, you're the only one that can get through to him…" Piper breathed, watching as the toddler glared at them all through the wavering barrier. "Go for it."

Brennan pursed his lips, cautiously moving to the edge of the shield and looking Connor's eyes, "Buddy, it's me, your Dad!" He said loudly, knowing that Connor wouldn't be able to hear him well within the shield, "Look, please, you have to believe me, we are not the bad guys here! We're your family! Your Aunt Piper always makes you Mac and cheese because your Mom always messes it up, remember? Your Aunt Paige, she sits and fingerpaints with you! Your Uncle Aidan taught you how to swim! Uncle Jesse and Aunt Lexa play hide and seek with you in Sanctuary! Remember? And me, I took you out on your first bike, I taught how to kick a ball around, I… I tucked you in at night… Oh! And we stayed up during that one big storm because we wanted to see the lightning forks!" He lowered is head, not knowing what else to say, "Connor, please… Come back to us." He held out his arms, not breaking eye contact with his son for a second.

Connor's eyes seemed to waver. He looked up at Annabelle, seeing nothing but hatred in her eyes as she glared at the six people outside. It was terrifying. And something that he had never seen in her before. His father, on the other hand, wasn't even concerned with her. He looked as if he was on the brink on tears, as if this whole situation was tearing him apart. Wordlessly, the child lowered his shield and sprung towards Brennan, where he was welcomed with a smothering hug, "Don't cry, Daddy…" He whispered, Brennan refusing to let him go.

"Oh, I've got no need now, buddy…" Brennan replied, swallowing and regaining his voice, "I'm just glad you're back."

"Pathetic…" Annabelle spat, glowering at the mutant as he back away, his son held tightly in his arms. "Doesn't matter. He wasn't powerful enough for what we needed anyway; he's useless to us now." She burst into a swarm of particles that flew through the air, landing next to Diam and placing a hand on his chest, "You've outlived your usefulness!" She barked in the Krontok's direction, hurling a crackling energy ball in his direction and reducing him into a pile of dust instantly before she vanished for good with Diam in a swirl of molecules and vanished from the scene.

Moments later, a stream of white lights erupted from the Krontok's remains. It split into two, one stream fading away, and the other flowing Piper's chest, restoring her powers, "Well…" She began with a smile, "It's good to be back in action!" She said proudly with a grin, before lighting up at the sight of her nephew, "And it's good to have you back!"

"So, I'm assuming that other cloud of lights was going to back to Phoebe?" Jesse questioned, "Wherever she is from here…" He murmured quietly, looking towards the dark, dank, sky with disdain.

"Okay, I don't mean to interrupt all the happiness here, but how are we supposed to get back now?" Lexa questioned, folding her arms and looking to people that were more knowledgeable when it came to matters of magic.

Aidan smirked a little, "I think now we have Connor back, we'll have power to get back home through our own portal." He said with a smile. "With the help of the Charmed Ones, of course." He added, looking down at Paige with a beaming smile.

"Alright then!" The witchlighter announced, clapping her hands, "Let's hit the road!"

* * *

Brennan sat in the hospital waiting room, Connor curled up at his side, sleeping soundly. The mutant looked out to the window, the morning sun illuminating his tired, beaten face. He raised his hand, looking at his watch and letting his head fall backwards. It was now five thirty in the morning. Everyone else was asleep around him, including Pamela, whose sudden appearance had confused him, but he was too tired to question it. Brennan knew he wouldn't sleep until he had delivered the news of Connor's safety to Phoebe, which could be hours.

"Mr. Mulwray?" A soft voice questioned. Brennan looked up to see one of the surgeons taking down her operating mask to reveal a large grin. "The c-section went very smoothly. Your wife is resting in the recovery room, she's still a little drowsy from the anesthetic, but she's perfectly fine."

"And the baby? What about her?" Brennan asked, standing up and causing Connor to awaken once again, joining his father in the standing position at his side.

The surgeon smiled, "There isn't a thing wrong her. She's completely healthy. Follow me…" She turned to lead him into the recovery room, before stopping and spinning around on her heel, "Would the rest of your family like to see her?"

"Um… Yeah, but not right now. We've all had a pretty rough day, so it'll just be me and my son for now." Brennan confirmed, ruffling Connor's hair affectionately before hoisting him into his arms and carrying him into the room.

Phoebe lay in bed, her head drooping down slightly from the fatigue and anesthetic. Her hair, normally styled perfectly, was a tangled, sweaty mess, but her cheeks were alive with joy at the newborn baby wrapped up in her arms, cooing gently as its tiny limbs moved around in the blanket. She looked up, her eyes dazzling with delight when she saw both husband and son. "You like hell." She joked to Brennan, who could only stare down at his new child in wonder.

"And you look beautiful…" He murmured back, putting a hand on her shoulder and rubbing it lovingly, leaning in a little to get a proper look at his little girl. She had the same skin tone as himself, but the rest of her was all Phoebe. Large hazel brown eyes stared up at him as he took her into her arms, while her small button nose twitched with fresh curiosity. He gently tickled her chin with his pinky finger, only to have her reach up and grasp his finger in her tiny fist, causing Brennan to burst out into the biggest smile his wife had ever seen.

Phoebe could only weakly smile in return, her head hitting the pillow heavily, "Looks like we've got a daddy's girl on our hands…"

* * *

"Hey…" Lexa murmured quietly as she entered the room, smiling at the sight of both Brennan and Connor at Phoebe's sides, entertaining the new baby that was in her arms, "I would have come in earlier, but I thought I'd give you guys some time by yourselves after Piper and Paige left… Why did they leave anyway?"

"They wanted to get the kids home and into bed, not to mention themselves." Phoebe replied quietly, "Speaking of which," She looked up to Brennan, who was sitting next to her on the bed, "I want you to go home and get some rest. You look more exhausted than I do. So does Connor, and I'm just about to put Faith down for a nap before going to sleep myself, so you'll be missing nothing."

"Oh, you're going to sleep? I'll just come back tomorrow or something." Lexa began, only for Phoebe to raise her hand in protest.

"No, you stay. I want to talk to you about something before you leave." She warned, before looking back to Brennan, "C'mon, I want to be able to rest if I know you're hanging around, running on empty. Please?"

Brennan mulled the thought over, before reluctantly nodding. "Alright. I guess I could do with some sleep." He stood up, carefully taking Faith from Phoebe, "I love you…" He murmured, kissing Phoebe on the head before heading towards the small crib that was perfect for Faith's size, "And I love you, baby girl." He smiled, settling the baby down comfortably before moving to the other side of the bed and hoisting Connor into his arms.

"I love you, Mommy!" He whispered loudly, careful to disturb his new baby sister.

"Love you too!" Phoebe replied at the same volume, blowing him a kiss as the two of them left the room, "Okay, so let's talk about your problem…" The middle Charmed One said with a hint of glee, pursing her lips and looking down at Lexa's stomach.

The mutant frowned in return, looking down at her stomach before her eyes widened, "Damnit!" She hissed, careful not wake up Faith, "How the hell did you figure it out? I wasn't going to tell you until I knew for sure…" She pouted, leaning back in the chair in and folding her arms.

"Well, I can tell you for sure that you're pregnant." Phoebe said with a smug look, "I could tell the moment I saw you last night. It doesn't matter if it's only a few weeks old, that baby of yours has feelings and I picked up on them instantly. I'm quite proud of myself actually; it's the first time I've done it." She lowered her head, raising both her eyebrows, "It is Jesse's, right?"

"Of course!" She snapped, before rubbing her forehead, "I'm sorry… Sleep deprivation and all. Can we talk about this later when we're both not so tired?"

"Yeah, I was about to tell you to get out anyway." Phoebe joked settling into her pillow, "Lex, don't worry about it. Everything's going to be okay. I'll help you through it, just like you helped me."

"You better." Lexa smirked as she left, "I'll see you… later." She had paused, noticing that her best friend had already fallen asleep. Lexa couldn't blame her, after spending the last thirty four hours in extremely painful labour, "Night, Pheebs…" She whispered, before shutting the door behind her.

* * *


	19. Flames On The Flesh

**Flames On The Flesh**

"She's so tiny…" Phoebe murmured gently as she looked down at her baby girl in the bassinet, "Do you remember when Connor was this small? You could hold him in one arm. These days, I can barely lift him with two." She mused, turning to Brennan who sat on the living room couch, slightly drowsy from the amount of times Faith had woken up during the night. "Oh, for God's sake, Bren. I know you're out of practice with the whole newborn baby sleeping hours, but it wasn't that bad. Only five times…" She trailed off, cringing a little.

"Yeah, I guess. My little girl is just a tiny bit high maintenance." He said with a smirk, rising from the couch and slinking his arms around her waist, "Just like her Mom…" The mutant joked, earning a slap on the arm from Phoebe as she turned around to face him, putting her arms around his neck and smiling fondly at him. "Happy?"

"Mmm… I guess." Phoebe replied with a smirk, leaning up and kissing him delicately on the lips before breaking contact and lightly hitting him on the arm, "Now, come on! We're gonna need some coffee if we hope to make it through today…" She ordered in a weary tone, chuckling a little when Brennan tiredly shuffled into the kitchen.

Her head turned as the mail dropped through the door. Letting out a sigh, Phoebe predicted the inevitable bills that came this time of the month. She picked up the mound of letters, flicking through them with little or no interest until she reached the bottom one that had an envelope marked with a red rose. San Francisco Memorial.

Putting the rest of the mail down on the small table at the door, she tore open the envelope, pulling out the piece of paper inside. Her eyes darted from side to side as she read its contents, widening with each line of text she finished while her other hand performed a relentless crush on the envelope in her palm. Hurling the crumpled piece of paper to the ground, Phoebe spun on her heel, setting towards the kitchen in frightful rage.

* * *

"Darryl, just calm down. People are killed in weird ways all the time. It's not always necessarily something supernatural." Piper argued to the cop on the other end of the line, bending down to light the final candle in a circle of five, "What? She was chained to a wooden pole, and then set on fire?" She bit her lip and cringed as Darryl went into specifics, "… Okay, that's probably worth checking out. I'll be there in half an hour. I've got something to take care of first. Can you hold off the coroner for that long? Good. I'll see you soon." She pulled the cordless from her ear, hanging up and putting the phone down in the Book of Shadow's altar. "Hear these words, hear my cry, spirit from the other side, come to me, I summon thee, cross now the Great Divide." 

A tornado of swirling white lights spun furiously in the centre of the candles, disturbing the gentle flames and causing them to nearly blow out from the wind. There was a bright flash as the lights dissipated, leaving an exact replica of Piper's niece, Pamela, standing in the circle. A stream of golden light flowed from her head to her feet, making her corporeal just seconds after her conjuration, "Piper…?" Prudence breathed, still in the modern day clothes of Pamela's that she had moved onto the afterlife in.

"Hi…" The eldest Charmed One trailed, pursing her lips, "Can I just call you Prue? Because Prudence is a little old fashioned in this day and age." She asked sweetly, shrugging her shoulders questioningly.

Prudence frowned a little, slightly hurt that her name had aged, "Um… Yes." She said hesitantly, before deciding to move on from the less then comfortable moment, "So, what brings me into the land of the living then? I certainly wasn't expecting you to be doing the summoning, seeing as how the last time we met, I stole the Book of Shadows, which… seems to have changed drastically in my absence…" She noted, gazing at the dark blue leather cover of the Book of Shadows with wonder and moving towards it. Her eyes widened at the sight of the silver triquetra, tracing the shape with her fingers and smiling airily, "Such amazing craftsmanship. I always wanted something like this when the book was mine. But alas, in my time, it was hard to find a blacksmith that wouldn't turn you in to the witch hunters for asking for a so called evil symbol to be forged from metal." She said sadly, "Hmm… A magical alloy. Impressive."

"What?" Piper questioned, walked over to the book and staring down at the shining symbol. "It's not just… silver? We always thought it was silver." Looking at the triquetra, Piper really couldn't see what Prudence was seeing, "How can you tell that it's magical?"

At this, the Wiccan spirit let out a small chuckle, "My dear, this isn't just some ornament to make the tome more appealing to the eye. Oh, no. It's a lot more than that." She ran left index finger down the book's spine, smiling fondly, "It'll keep this book safe for many generations to come… Even after you join me in the spiritual haven."

"Speaking of which, I'd like to avoid that time for as long as possible," Piper stated, "So I'd like your help on something." She gently moved Prudence away from the book so she could turn its pages. "Do you recognize these two?" She asked, turning the head of the altar towards Prudence to show her two pictures that had been magically inserted into the book, showing Diam and Annabelle with a page of information opposite.

Prudence studied the two pages carefully, her eyes narrowing at the pictures, "Hmm… no, I don't recognize them, but something about them is striking a nerve in my mind somewhere. Why did you think I would be able to help?"

"Well, you're powerful, and these guys are strong…" Piper trailed off a little, nervously tapping her fingers on the side of the altar, "… And, you know, these guys are also ancient, and you're one of the oldest spirits I know." She raised her hands in a defensive position, "No offence."

The witch merely frowned, "Why would I take offence? Age is nothing to be ashamed of. With it, comes wisdom, and with wisdom, comes power. I take it as a compliment that you were to call me ancient." She said proudly, putting on a regal smile as she approached the book again.

"Well, that makes one of us…" Piper murmured to herself in an amused tone before hearing the nearing sound of footsteps coming up the attic steps. She raised her hands, ready to blast anything that was trying to come at her from an unorthodox angle. The eldest Charmed One was pleasantly surprised when Phoebe appeared in the doorway, holding Faith to her chest as she walked in, "Hey, how'd you get in?"

"Wyatt." Phoebe replied stonily, bouncing with each step she took to try and keep the baby calm. "I left Connor playing with Chris downstairs and Faith's baby bag is also in the foyer. Is that alright?" Before Piper could answer, the middle Charmed One had turned to Prudence with a confused look, "Okay, you never visit unless there's a dire emergency, so what's going on?"

Piper gave her sister a look, before her eyes widened in realization, "Oh! Wait! No, this isn't Pam. Prudence Warren, past life. You remember, don't you?"

"Oh, right, sorry. In my defense, it's kinda an easy mistake to make…" Phoebe retorted, before the fussy gurgles from baby in her arms broke her train of thought, "Oh, its okay, sweetie… It's okay…" She said soothingly, patting the child's back and rubbing it through the blanket. "So there's no emergency?"

"Nope, none whatso… Darryl!" Piper suddenly blurted out, before leaning over the altar towards Phoebe and grinning, "Say, how would you feel about checking out a crime scene? Take Prue and I'll look after the kids." She watched as Phoebe began to protest, before assaulting her with more alluring offers, "Look, you were bitching all through your pregnancy about how you were never on the frontline, so now's your chance. Besides, your premonition power will be a lot handier than any of mine."

"I dunno… this would be the first time I'm leaving her without a parent…"

"Then why didn't you leave her with Brennan in the house?" Piper shot her sister a questioning glare as she began to go over what Phoebe had said when she had entered, "Actually, why did you even bring the kids at all… actually, why are you even here in the first place?"

Phoebe looked down at the floor, still bouncing on the spot a little, "So, a crime scene, huh?" She finally breathed out, trying to change the subject, "Yeah, okay, I'll check it out." She walked across to Piper, carefully handing Faith over to her aunt before turning to Prudence, "C'mon, we'll take my car. Have you got an address for me?"

"Uh… yeah, I wrote it down on a piece of paper in the kitchen. Hey!" Piper called out, grabbing Phoebe by the arm as she and Prudence headed for the stairs, "Talk to me. What's going on?"

Phoebe responded by shaking her head and letting out a wry chuckle, raising her head and revealing that her eyes, under closer scrutiny, were red and puffy from crying, "Later… alright? I just… I just can't get into this right now…" She whispered hoarsely, spinning on her heel and striding out of the attic.

Piper stood at the altar, merely able to make a face at the current situation before she lifted Faith up to her eye level, smiling widely, "What did your Daddy do now?"

* * *

Aidan rose his head from the water for a second, inhaling a sharp intake of air before diving back down. The sound of the rushing water around was just enough to drown out the sound of blood pumping through his ears as he neared the dock at the phenomenal rate. In all honesty, he didn't even need to hold his breath while underwater. He was completely amphibious, the only thing missing was the gills, but something told him Paige wouldn't be too fond of them. 

"Okay, how'd I do?" He asked, putting hands on the dock where Paige sat cross legged, sucking on a cherry red lollipop that was turning her tongue red.

She looked down at him with a frown, "How am I supposed to know?" She asked, "Hun, you know you're probably the fastest swimmer in the world. I don't think the length of time it takes for you to reach the other side of the lake is going to make a difference." Before she continued, she raised her hand, batting away a bug that was buzzing around her exposed lollipop, clearly attracted to the sweetness of the candy, "And besides, how am I supposed to time you? We don't own a stop clock."

Aidan ran a hand over his face, trying to swipe away the water that was dripping in his eyes, "Well, if you're not doing anything, why don't you come join me in here? I know you've got that deep green bikini on under your clothes." He said with a smirk, raising his eyebrows before flicking his hand in the water and splashing her, "C'mon! It's not as if you're doing anything on land besides rotting your teeth."

Paige took the lollipop out of her mouth, glowering at her husband as he treaded water in front of her, "Sugar free." She retorted sassily, "I switched to them after many a lecture to Piper. Okay, well, maybe I didn't switch immediately, but she thought I did." The witchlighter smirked, putting the lollipop back in her mouth, "Besides, I'm not a big fan of this lake…"

"What? You should have told me. I wouldn't have brought you here." Aidan assured her, before mentally hitting himself for being so idiotic, 'Aw, Paige… I'm sorry for bringing you here. With everything that happened with your Mom…"

She shook her head vigorously in response, "No! It's got nothing to do with Mom. Well, maybe a little. But I'm perfectly fine when I'm sitting on the dock, I just don't want to go into the water." Seeing that he was clearly curious, Paige smiled a little and looked down at her crossed legs as she began to explain, "Well, when I was sixteen, I…" A look of realization crossed her porcelain face, "Oh my God…"

_Paige let out another loud laugh as Glenn told another crude joke. She raised the bottle of cheap beer to her lips, taking a large swig of the frosty liquid before it was snatched out of her hands by her boyfriend who she was leaning back on. It wasn't long before she heard a loud belch behind her, which sent Michelle Niglith and her boyfriend of the week into hysterical laughter, "Glenn!" She shrieked, smacking one of the legs that she was sitting between before sniggering a little herself._

"_Sorry, Noogie." He murmured apologetically in her ear, giving her a kiss on the cheek before clinking bottles with Michelle's boyfriend and taking another swig of beer. Glenn looked to his right, frowning a little before bringing what he saw to the attention of the other three. "Hey, look, The Fish is back." He said, making them turn their heads to see an eighteen year old Aidan tying up a small boat at the dock. "God, does he actually spend any time on land?"_

_Michelle shrugged, "I think he's pretty hot. He's a Senior at Baker High. Freebie Halliwell tried to put the moves on him at Trevor's party before her big sister dragged her out and took her home." She took another swig of beer before looking down at her boyfriend who was lying down on the embankment, "Hey, Doug. Do remember which sister it was? Prue or Piper?"_

"_Prue." He replied immediately, "I remember the other one being a total nerd. Even when she was a Senior she didn't have the stones to stand up to freshmen." He said with a chuckle, before Paige suddenly swiped out and smacked him hard in the chest with her fist, "Ow!" He wheezed as Michelle knelt down beside him, "What the hell is wrong with you?"_

"_Your voice was annoying me." Paige grunted. Truth was, she didn't know why she had suddenly lashed out. She had just felt such anger boiling up in her body towards Doug and had needed to release it in any way possible, "Besides, I've seen you take crap from little girls in public, so Gods knows what you're like in school!"_

"_Lay off, Matthews." Michelle growled darkly, "Are you alright, baby?" She cooed to Doug, helping him into a sitting position as he glared at Paige, who was now staring stonily out towards the lake._

"_Yeah… She hits like a girl…"_

"_Oh?" Paige raised an eyebrow, along with her fist, "Want another one for your troubles?"_

_Glenn, who had been completely oblivious to these events, suddenly tapped Paige's shoulder, "Hey, you guys! The Fish has gone up the hill to help that old woman Johnson. What do you say we untie his boat and push out into the lake?" He suggested with a mischievous glint in his eye that Paige had loved since they were toddlers._

"_Yeah, let's do it!" Michelle said enthusiastically, pulling Doug to his feet as Glenn stood up. "Paige, you coming?" She asked, as it seemed Paige was just sitting with her beer, drawing random patterns in the thin layer of dirt._

"_Nah, you guys go ahead. Just tell me when things go bottom up and I have to make a run for it." She droned. Paige had seen many a scheme of Glenn's backfire on him too many times to take part now. The result was usually the police escorting them home, and with a two month grounding for being caught smoking already upon her, Paige didn't need the added punishment that would come with a police ride home. The only reason she had managed to get out was because her parents had gone to visit her aunt and uncle for the day._

_She took a deep breath, inhaling the clean air before stuffing the neck of the beer bottle into her mouth. It was a weird habit, but she would always chew at the glass bottle when she was finished. She suspected that was probably why she had needed braces in the first place. She continued to do this for a few minutes, watching as her friends reached the dock, before a glimmer in the water caught her eye._

_Paige turned back around to the lake, now clearly seeing that the sun was catching off something shiny in the water. It didn't look too deep, so she decided to take her chances and investigate. Standing up, she rolled up the legs of her jeans and began to wade into the lake. The glimmer seemed to be further out than she'd realized, and Paige considered going back, but something was drawing her closer._

_No longer caring if her clothes got wet or not, Paige continued her trek into the water, and didn't stop until it was up past her elbows. She just standing right above the shining object, and she jumped a little so she could dive down to retrieve it. That was her mistake._

_The moment she disappeared from the surface, she felt something suddenly surround her body and pull her deeper into the lake at a phenomenal rate. Taken by surprise, Paige hadn't had time to take in a deep breath, and water was now rapidly filling her lungs as she was just rushed forward, the water hitting her like a sledgehammer. She began to slow down, and immediately started to thrash for freedom. She could feel her consciousness slipping away from her, and eventually, she'd drown._

_Looking around for any form of help, her eyes scanned the immediate area, before she saw someone making their way towards her, moving through the water like a torpedo. She weakly reached out towards person before her eyelids began to droop, the last thing she heard being an unnatural gargled roar of pain before she blacked out…_

… _Someone was pinching her nose…_

… _Someone was breathing into her mouth…_

… _Someone was pushing down on her chest…_

… _Someone was pinching her nose. Again._

_It wasn't required, as Paige suddenly shot up from her lying down position, coughing and spluttering as water rose up from her lungs and flew from her mouth, going all over the embankment. She kept her eyes firmly shut, afraid that her rescue was just a dream, until someone started to gently pat her back, "You should get it all up in one go. It's pretty unpleasant to wake up in the morning and find out you spat water all over your pillow in the night."_

_She opened her eyes, not recognizing the voice. It was The Fish. Now that she was seeing him close up, Paige had to admit he was pretty handsome. His was soaked from head to toe, his clothes dripping on the embankment, a sign that he had been the one that had rescued her. "Thank y-," She was interrupted by another flood of water cascading from her mouth. He patted her back._

"_You'll probably be doing that for the rest of the day. Although you won't be coughing up that amount each time." He said with a grin that managed to make her smile._

"_Paige!" Glenn shouted, running as fast as he could before falling to his knees and skidding the rest of the way, wrapping his arms around her and not caring if he got soaked himself, "What the hell were you thinking? Worrying me like that…" He was about to continue, before his girlfriend spat water over his shoulder._

_Her savior gently pushed Glenn back, "You should probably give her a little space."_

_For once, he listened to someone who clearly knew more about situation than he did, "Dude, thank you so much. If there's anything I can do to make it up to you…" Glenn offered. Silently, Aidan pointed towards the untied boat that was now slowly drifting out into the lake, "Aw, crap! I'm on it!" He said loudly, jumping to his feet and sprinting back to the dock, trying to signal to Michelle and Doug to bring the boat back._

_After several coughing fits, Paige managed to get her breathing in order enough to splutter out a few simple words, "Thank you…"_

_He patted her back as she was thrown into another coughing fit from speaking, "Any time."_

"It was you…" Paige breathed, blinking when Aidan splashed her to get her attention, as it seemed she had gone into a daydream. "It was you, you saved me that day!" She blurted out excitedly, "Do you remember? It was Glenn and my friends that untied the boat and… you saved me from drowning."

Aidan frowned, swimming back towards the dock, "Um… Don't take this the wrong way, but I saved a lot of girls from drowning when I was in high sch… Oh my God." He folded his arms, leaning on the dock, "You were lucky I was there…" He said darkly.

"Hah! Don't flatter yourself. I _can_ swim, you know." She scoffed, putting the lollipop back in her mouth.

"No, really. That day… I saved you from the same demon that killed your Mom. It must have sensed your connection to its last victim." He explained slowly, making sure Paige realized the severity of what he was trying to say. "That's one of the main reasons I spent so much time here. I knew something was in here, and that day, when I saw you going after something in the lake, I knew it was trying to lure you in."

Paige frowned a little, smirking, "You were watching me?"

"Well, watching your friends untie my boat." He said with a hint of resentment, "Then I saw you wading out into the lake for no apparent reason, then water started to bubble around you… Well, that's when I broke into a run to say the least. That demon was one tough bastard, got I managed to fend it off before it was too late to resuscitate you." He gave her a found smile, "After all, only the Power of Three could vanquish it, and your sisters took care of it seven years later."

The witchlighter shook her head, "No… They didn't. My Dad was the one that vanquished it. He sacrificed his second life to get it out of the lake." She said with a hint of pride, before shrugging a little, "From what Phoebe told me, they faced it when they were still learning the ropes about their powers, so I guess they didn't realize they could write their own Power of Three vanquish… Anyway, I hope this means you're not going to be trying to get me in this lake anytime soon!"

"Actually, quite the opposite." He said, swimming back out a little before turning around to face her, "Look, Paige, for the last four months, I've spent every morning in this lake. If there was any type of evil being in here, I'd know about it. Even the smallest aquatic imp! Trust me, I'll keep you safe." He swam back to her, a devilish grin on his face, "If you don't, I'm just going to…" He threw his hand into the water, splashing her, "… keep…" Again, "… splashing…" Again, "… You!"

Paige placed her hands on her hips as her eyes widened manically, "Oh, fine!" She snapped, grabbing the hem of her blouse and ripping it over her head, exposing the tasteful green bikini top underneath before unbuttoning her jeans and taking them down to her ankles, showing off the swimwear she had had all along. "You want me in the water so badly?" She asked rhetorically, before gracefully diving into the lake and hardly disturbing the surface. Paige took a few moments before she surfaced, her eyes wide with shock, "It's freezing!"

* * *

"Darryl!" Phoebe called as discreetly as she could from behind the yellow tape, along with all the passers by that had gathered to see what had brought the police into the area. She was pleased when the family friend turned around, giving her his usual shocked and irritated stare every time a Charmed One showed up at one of his crime scenes. "He may look a little pissed, but secretly, he's glad to see us." She whispered to Prudence, who was feeling a little overloaded in the twenty first century. 

"Let them through. They're with me." Darryl droned, signaling to the uniform at the edge of the tape who lifted the barrier, letting Phoebe and Prudence through, "Young guy called it in early this morning. We've been doing interviews around the complex. No one saw anything, heard anything… I don't buy it, but I'll let you two do what you do so well."

"Oh, we've never met." Prudence suddenly interrupted, realizing immediately that he had mistaken her for Pamela.

Darryl stopped in his tracks and turned to the two witches, giving each of them a suspicious glance before looking down at Phoebe, "Is this some weird witch amnesia thing? Or she is she possessed?" The middle Charmed One opened her mouth to explain, but the cop put his hand up, "On second thought… I don't even wanna know."

"Probably a wise choice." Phoebe agreed as they resumed walking into the courtyard of the apartment complex, "So, why don't you believe that no one saw anything? You're usually pretty trusting."

"You'll see in a minute." He warned as they walked through the archway into the courtyard, police still swarming around the scene with forensic kits and others just taking notes. The three of them came out of the tunnel like structure, reaching the courtyard, "Now, you wanna tell me how no one saw or heard _that_ happen?" Darryl asked, pointing towards the central crime scene.

Phoebe a few steps forward, clamping her hand over her mouth in horror. "Oh my God…"

There was a large stone dimple in the centre of the courtyard, and in it, stood one of the tallest, thickest pieces of wood that Phoebe had ever seen. A large pile of different drifts of wood had been placed around it, making it really look like a stake where a witch would be burned. But the most horrifying thing about it was the charred corpse that was somehow tethered to the centre pole. The skin had been burned away in presumably fierce flames, only the teeth of the person seemed to be intact without harm. Bile rose in her throat the moment Phoebe noticed that smoke was still rising from the carcass, while the repugnant stench of death filled the air. "Perhaps things haven't changed in this time as much as I thought…" Prudence said sorrowfully, silently promising to comfort this lost life when she returned to the spiritual realm.

"Lieutenant, just who are these women you've brought onto an extremely delicate crime scene?" A particularly rude forensics expert asked as he approached the three of them, glaring at two witches suspiciously before shooting a rather patronizing look towards Darryl.

Before he could respond, Phoebe stepped in, bringing her credit card out from her pocket and summoning a psionic blast to her head, propelling it into the man's head in a gentle flash. "Nora Cartwright. Head supervisor at the San Francisco Crime Lab." She said confidently, holding up her credit card as if it was an I.D., "Get your people out of here. My team and I are taking over the case."

"Yes, ma'am!" He replied immediately, turning to the various forensic officers on the scene, "Alright everyone, bag and tag everything we've got and leave it. This case is no longer ours." He said with a hint of resentment before turning to go past the trio, only for Phoebe to lay a hand on his chest and stop him.

"If I ever hear you talking to a fellow officer in the condescending tone you addressed Lieutenant Morris with, you can be sure I'll be taking the matter further. Is that understood?" She said lowly and with a smug little smile on her lips as the man nodded vigorously before breezing past her as fast as he could. "I never get tired of doing that. This has to be the fifth time I've made a different identity."

Darryl cracked an amused smile, "I'll leave you guys to it. I'll be out there continuing the interviews if there's anything you need." He told them, before turning around and heading back through the arched tunnel to the entrance of the apartment complex.

"Okay…" Phoebe began, seeing that the complex was in a square shape around them with a lot of viewing access to the courtyard from the living areas, "Magic was definitely involved if no one saw this go down. Either this whole thing happened magically, or something's made these people forget what they saw,"

Prudence scanned the area with a suspicious eye, "Or the people who live here are a part of this…" She said darkly, "You have the gift of ethereal sensing, do you not? You're able to see into the past with the tones you pick up?"

"Um… If you mean do I have the power of premonition, then yes." Phoebe replied with a snigger, "Why don't you check out the pyre. I'll have a look through this evidence and I see if I can get a vision."

Prudence wandered around the perimeter of the scene, looking towards the large pole in the centre with a mixture of anger and primal fear. "This indent in the ground…" She began, referring to the large stone dimple in the courtyard, "… people would build a witch's pyre in them so that the flames would be contained within the deeper ground. I'm willing to hazard a guess by saying that, if you were to move all this wood, you'd find a crucifix chiseled into the stone base."

Phoebe looked up from rifling through the evidence, "Did it hurt…?" She asked quietly, "Being burned, I mean. You were a powerful witch. You could have easily escaped if you had wanted. So why didn't you?"

"What good would it have done?" The Wiccan spirit asked, her question having many more levels than she let on, "My lover was dead, my child was gone, there was nothing left but a bitter revenge that kept me bound to this world for three centuries. Besides, with the amount of precautions they had taken in my capture, only a vast amount of deadly magic would have saved me. And that would have just made them more passionate in killing innocent witches. No… I'm proud of my decision." She said with a confident nod.

Phoebe went back to going through the evidence that had already been bagged and tagged by the forensic crew, stopping when she saw a pair of ancient iron shackles that must have survived the inferno, "Hey, can you check to see what's keeping her tied to that pole? Because I think I've found something." She said, noticing crucifixes crafted into the restraints.

Complying, Prudence began to climb up the pyre, cursing a little when she put her hand on a piece of smoldering wood, burning her palm, "It's over now…" She whispered to the charred body, having learned to respect the dead, "Nothing is around her wrists." She relayed, looking down at the burnt arms which were still around the pole, "The fire probably burned away her flesh, making her wrists and hands thin enough for the shackles to fall off." She explained.

Phoebe looked down at the wrapped up shackles in her hands. She needed direct physical contact with the item if she had any hope of getting a premonition. She was considering tearing open the evidence seal, when her cellphone started to go off. She reached into her pocket, reading the caller I.D. on the screen and groaning, "Bastard…" She snarled to herself, as Prudence approached her, turning the phone off and stuffing it back into her pocket. "I can't open this bag, but I need to get a premonition." She voiced her dilemma, shrugging a little.

The witch laid her hand on the top of the plastic, closing her eyes and muttering something under her breath as she cast a spell. Her eyes suddenly shot open, and her fingers tensed on the bag, "Dissero."

Phoebe frowned at the seemingly useless spell, before a golden flash flew from Prudence's palm, going into the iron shackles and lighting them up with a warm glow. The moment it happened, the middle Charmed One felt a jolt run up her body from her fingers, before a premonition assaulted her mind.

_It was night. Phoebe could tell from the dark tones of the monochrome sky. The scene was completely peaceful, with only the large trees in the complex swaying gently in the summer wind. Something more vicious kicked up; however, as the foliage began to rock back and forth wickedly, creaking a little as the now strong wind blew them back and forth. The stone indent in the centre of the courtyard was of course unaffected, until it started to glow with an unearthly blue light. Energy rippled from the shining stone, growing more and more violent before there was a harsh flash that momentarily obscured Phoebe's vision, before she could see that the burnt out pyre was standing there. It had appeared out of thin air._

Phoebe let out a gasp as she came out of the vision, taking deep breaths and preparing to tell Prudence what she saw, until her head suddenly jerked back with her mouth gaping in surprise. "Phoebe…?" The middle Charmed One brought her head back forward, revealing that her eyes were now shining with the same golden glow that had come from Prudence's hand. Welts began to appear on her face, blood trickling down her cheeks, and yet she remained serenely calm. A large purple bruise began to slowly fade in on her chin, while blood started to collect at the bottom of her right leg as a wound opened up in the side of her thigh. The glow in her eyes disappeared with a flash, and she hit the ground, heavily injured by whatever she had seen.

* * *

Golden light flashed violently in the Manor foyer, depositing Phoebe and Prudence in the house. Phoebe had been fully healed, thanks to her ancestor, but her jeans were still stained with her own blood and her look had been distant ever since she had been revived. It was still a mystery to her how she had received such a strong vision. "Piper!" She shouted, rounding into the living room, "We need to…" She trailed off, her face darkening at the sight of Brennan sitting on the couch with Faith in his arms, sleeping peacefully. 

"You should probably keep it down." Piper suggested quietly from the armchair across the sofa, before rising and walking over to Brennan, "C'mon, sweetie…" She whispered to her niece she took her from her father, "… why don't we get you into a nice comfortable bassinet?" She whispered gently, walking out the room and subtly signaling to Prudence to follow her.

"What are you doing here?" Phoebe addressed her husband with such disgust that anyone that had overheard her speaking would have thought they were bitter divorcees.

"You weren't taking my calls. I knew you'd probably be here." He replied, standing up from the sofa and moving towards his wife. Even though he towered over her and was physically stronger, Brennan couldn't help but feel slightly intimidated by the look on her face, "Look, Phoebe, I-," He went to put his hands on her shoulders, only for her throw her arms out and shove him away from her, making him stumble back slightly.

"If you value your life, you'll stay right where you are, because I won't be responsible for my actions if you lay a finger on me." She snarled darkly, folding her arms tightly across her chest, slowly shaking her head with growing anger, "How… could you…?" She whispered; the tears from earlier starting to come back.

"Phoebe, I'm sorry…" He said wearily, stepping towards her again, only for her to take a step back, "I don't know why I did it, but I haven't been around that much and I thought that you may have-,"

"Gotten pregnant with someone else's child?" She finished for him, before reaching into the pocket of her jacket and pulling out a folded up sheet of paper, waving it in front of him, "Don't you want to see what it says, Bren?" She asked with a sarcastic tone, "I mean, you obviously thought I was enough of a _whore_ to get it done in the first place, so go ahead! Have a look!" She shouted, cocking her head when all Brennan did was lower his head in shame, "Oh, you're not going to look at it? Okay, I'll tell you what it says…" She began unfolding the paper feverishly, starting to read from it in a patronizing tone, "And the result is… Faith _is_ actually your child. Does that come as a surprise to you?"

"Of course not!" He shouted back, grabbing the paternity test and ripping it to shreds before her eyes, "I knew that would be the answer."

"No… no, you didn't. If you had, you wouldn't have even got this done in the first place!" She shrieked, glaring at him, "But hey, while we're at it, why don't we take Connor down the hospital so they can take a quart of his blood and test it? You know, just to make sure _he_ is actually _your_ child too!"

"Don't be stupid!"

"Look whose talking!" She bellowed back, before finally putting a lid on her temper and heaving a large sigh, putting her hand on her forehead, "I can't deal with this right now… I have to talk to my sisters; I have to sort things out…" She turned away to head up towards the attic, but Brennan grabbed her arm to stop her. "Don't even _touch_ me!" She protested loudly, thrashing out of his grip and bearing her teeth as she glared at him.

"Our marriage is on the line, Phoebe!" Brennan bellowed return, looking at her fiercely, "You can't just run off to your damn sisters!"

"_You're the one who put it on that line!_" She shrieked back, her voice at a volume she had never reached before in her life, "I mean, who are we kidding here, Brennan? This marriage was doomed the moment you _abandoned_ your family for your job! And you've just pushed it over the edge with this… And when I go home tonight, I don't want you to be there…"

Brennan's eyes widened in shock, "What…?"

"Pack up your stuff. I don't care where you go; I just can't have you in my house." She sighed angrily, turning away from him, "God! I can't even look at you right now! Just please, go." She scrunched up her eyes as she heard him stride past her, wrenching the door open and slamming it behind him.

The moment he was gone, Piper appeared at the top of the stairs, cautiously making her way down them and towards her little sister, whose hair she stroked affectionately before pulling her into a loving hug, "Do want to talk about it?" Piper asked calmly, rubbing Phoebe's back.

She let out a choked laugh, "You have no idea!" She blurted out with a sob before pulling away and smiling as convincingly as she could, "But… not right now, alright? We need to get Paige. I have something to share with you two…"

* * *

"You know, I feel kinda guilty about this…" Paige admitted, using the stirrer in her drink to spin the slice of lemon around in her water, spreading the fruit's sour taste through her beverage, "We've packed off the twins to their friend's house for a day and have been relaxing when we haven't really needed it. Phoebe and Brennan would probably kill for a day like this right now." 

Aidan peered over the menu he was looking at, putting it down on the table to address his wife's guilt, "Paige, we haven't had a day like this since our honeymoon, and that was before Phoebe was pregnant! Any couple with kids should take a chance for a day like this. It's what keeps us sane." He said, raising glass of water to his lips and nearly drinking down half the glass in one gulp before Paige stopped him.

"Hey!" She said, putting her hand on his wrist and gently forcing it downwards, "Just because you swim like a fish, doesn't mean you have to drink like one!"

Aidan frowned a little, knowing that he had heard something like that before. He thought about it for a few moments, before the answer hit him and he could only smile at the memory…

_A twenty one year old Aidan wearily raised his hand up to the handle of the toilet, flushing it again from his sitting position on the floor, over the bowl. He could usually handle large amounts of alcohol, so this sudden bout of vomiting had taken him by surprise. The base from the music outside was making the whole room shake, and only adding to his nausea. This was the worst party he had ever been to._

_The door to the bathroom opened and all he could see was a pair of slender, jean clad legs walk towards the sink. "Paige, why do you come to these things when everyone does nothing but get drunk?" A girl's voice said. It appeared this 'Paige' was talking to herself in the grimy mirror of the dorm bathroom. She let out a sigh, "I shouldn't have come to this thing…"_

"_What…?" Aidan wondered out loud, gaining Paige's attention._

_She looked down, cringing a little, "Oh, nothing I was talking to myself. And wow, you are in a bad way. Just because you swim like a fish, doesn't mean you have to drink like one… You are that guy on the swim team, right?" She asked uncertainly. "C'mon, sit up and sober up." She advised, helping him up to the edge of the bathtub. "I've had a lot of bad experiences with alcohol, and I can tell you the best remedy is a cold glass of water." She grabbed a glass that was being used as a toothbrush holder and filled it up with water, giving it to him and exchanging it for his beer bottle. Paige took one sniff at the liquid and recoiled immediately, "Whoa, I think someone's gone and spiked your drink for a joke. Idiots. They could have killed you."_

_Aidan shakily raised the glass to his lips, feeling a bit better as the cold, clean liquid washed down his throat, "Thanks…"_

"_Any time." She replied brightly, before Aidan lunged off the edge of the bathtub to vomit once again into the toilet…_

"Are you even listening to me?" Paige asked with a frown as it seemed her husband had just gone into a trance as she was talking. "Hello, Aidan…?" She waved a hand in front of his face, finally getting his attention.

"Oh, yeah… sorry," He said, picking up his menu again, "So, what are we having for lunch?"

She was about to respond, when her cellphone went off in her purse. Reaching down with a sigh, Paige pulled it out, flipping it open and answering it, "Hello." She droned wearily, not in the mood to ruin her lunch. Aidan watched as his wife's expression fell deeper and deeper the longer she was on the phone, "Okay, I'll be right there." She snapped the cellphone shut, biting her lip, "I gotta go. We've got trouble."

* * *

Phoebe stood in front of the Book of Shadows, trying to put together her thoughts into a way that her sisters would be able to understand. She had seen so much in her vision, that she knew, but she just couldn't remember all of it. It was infuriating for her, but she had remembered enough to tell her sisters something that would shock them to their core. 

The clomping of shoes started to get louder as Piper and Paige came up the attic steps, making their entrance, "Okay, what's going on? I come in to find Prudence Warren playing with my nephews, and…" Paige noticed the blood that had soaked into Phoebe's jeans, her jaw dropping, "… my sister bleeding out from her leg! What the hell happened?"

"Later." Phoebe cut her off quickly, "You guys should probably sit down. I have some pretty big news to share with you."

"What is it?" Piper asked, sitting down on the arm of the sofa as her youngest sister plopped down into the cushions, "Did you and Prue figure out what was with the suddenly appearing burnt woman in that apartment complex?"

"Uh… It was a time portal opened up by the residual magic of all the witch's lives that had been lost over the burning pit. A burntout pyre from the past had fell through.We closedthe portaland cast a relinquishment ritual before we left… But that's not the point." She walked around the tome's altar, folding her arms, "When I was trying to get a premonition at the crime scene, Prudence cast a spell on the thing I was holding so my power would work, that's how I figured out the time portal thing… But, the spell must have amplified my powers, because the moment that vision ended, I got another one, and I saw… everything."

Paige frowned as she played with her earlobe, "Everything?"

"Everything." Phoebe repeated. "Past, present, future. I was standing still while time moved around me… It was amazing." She breathed, thinking once again of her experience, "But, I saw a certain part of our future… our final battle, and this is it." She said simply, starting to explain what she meant, "Diam and Annabelle … They serve a higher power, something more powerful than anything we've ever faced. This is the only thing I can remember, so I must be destined to tell you this…"

"Tell us what?" Piper asked desperately, throwing her hands up in despair, "Phoebe, what the hell are you talking about? Who are we going to fight in the end?"

Phoebe gulped, knowing that what she said next would shatter their calm moods, "It's the Hollow…"

The eldest and youngest Charmed Ones both recoiled in horror at the name Phoebe had uttered. They had only faced the Hollow once before, and, had it not been for the premeditated plans of the Seer, they would have been killed. It had been described at the Ultimate Power in the Book of Shadows, having the ability to absorb anything and everything in its path, which would no doubt eventually lead to the world's absorption and destruction, "But… the Hollow is… neutral. Why do we need to go up against it? How has it even got out?" Piper breathed.

"It hasn't got out. Yet." Phoebe clarified, "You see, in my little journey through time, I learned that Diam and Annabelle, while being separate entities themselves, are actually agents of the Hollow. They kidnapped Connor so they would have the power to summon it from its crypt, but even he wasn't strong enough…"

"How are we supposed to fight something that's been around for all of eternity?" Paige asked quietly, the fear evident in her voice.

Phoebe bit her lip in frustration, "I don't know…" She admitted, putting her hand on her forehead, "And if I could remember more of my stupid vision, I would be able to tell you so we can end this quickly!"

"Mom!" Wyatt shouted as run into the room, clearly out of breath from running so fast, "Prudence!" He blurted out, taking in a breath, "She just vanished! Black lights appeared around her, and she just… vanished." He told them, frowning at the looks of realization on the three witches' faces.

"They need power to summon the Hollow from its crypt…" Paige murmured, looking up at Phoebe, "It doesn't get much more powerful than the beginning of our family's magic."

* * *

"This won't hold me forever, you know." Prudence said confidently from her place within an expertly drawn hexagram, etched specifically to bind her magic to this spot from what she could tell by the symbols drawn in each point of the pentagram. "I've managed to get out of more powerful traps than this…." She spat as Annabelle laid a piece of dark matter outside the pentagram, enforcing the cage. 

"Oh, I know, sweetie." Annabelle said with a smirk, standing up, "But it'll certainly contain you for long enough so we can get our use out of you." She folded her arms, giving Prudence a large smile, "But go ahead, waste your energy on trying to escape. At the end of the day, we only need the raw power that you have but can't tap into, so throw a magical tantrum for all I care."

The witch bared her teeth, holding out her hands so they were facing the ground, "Libertas!" She roared, golden energy bursting from her hands like a flash grenade and pounding the perimeter of the hexagram with all her power, causing the force field to waver slightly before her spell gave out, exhausting her of all her strength. She fell to her knees, breathing heavily, "Damn you…"

Annabelle cocked an eyebrow, "Told you." She said smugly, "Now, I'm guessing you only have one of those in you, so if you don't mind, keep it down. We have work to do…" With that, she spun on her heel, striding proudly out of the abandoned classroom and leaving Prudence to seethe.

"How's our visitor doing?" Diam asked as he made the finishing touches to the altar that would give them a boost of power. "I certainly hope she's not using up all her magic trying to get out. The last thing we need is another failed attempt." He walked towards his comrade, crossing the expanse of the Great Hall just in time to hear Annabelle scoff at the notion.

"Oh, please. She can cast as many spells as she likes. It won't make a difference. I've put the dark matter crystals around the hexagram, so any magic she wastes will just be absorbed by them and be ours for the taking." She explained, before looking over Diam's shoulder and gazing at the altar, her eyes gleaming with excitement, "Are we ready?" She asked quietly.

"As long as you drew the symbol in the hexagram that allows us to tap into the witch's powers, then yes." He replied, taking her hand and moving back towards the altar, ready to try again at what they had failed at with Connor as a source of power. The two of them shared a nervous glance, before beginning to chant the new spell they had concocted to summon the Hollow. "Nosdicos super incacasus, waspernous col molan, mul du uspa a du pudas!"

A supernatural wind blew around the two of them, sending a pleasant chill down their spines. A beacon of light suddenly ignited a few feet away from them, floating above the ground as it pulsed, setting off a powerful flash of light every second. It continued to do this. Annabelle and Diam watched in amazement as the flashes began to come closer together, before they were going so fast it seemed like the beacon was shining constantly. There was an echoing screech before one last blinding flash, and it was gone, leaving a coal black, diamond encrusted box on the floor.

"We did it…" Annabelle breathed as Diam reached down to pick up the box in which the Hollow had been contained thousands of years ago, "Open it. Let our Master take our willing bodies and smite the Charmed Ones with everything that it is!" She said lavishly, running a hand over the box affectionately.

"You could try…" A voice said. Diam and Annabelle turned around, seeing Phoebe and Paige standing cockily in the large doorway to the Great Hall.

"Careful… The eldest is no doubt skulking around here somewhere…" Diam murmured, before putting a large grin on his face, "But you're too late!" He shouted manically with a laugh, undoing the latch on the box and throwing the lid open. A light shone from inside, illuminating both their faces before a stream of pitch black particles flew from the interior, flying into their eyes, mouths, and nostrils, filling them with the Ultimate Power and making them unstoppable.

"You don't stand a chance now…" Annabelle growled, her eyes flipping to a shiny beetle black as the Hollow completed its possession of her body.

"Oh no?" Paige said with a raised eyebrow, before flinging out her arm and hurling a potion vial towards the duo. It smashed at their feet, a plume of rich emerald flames exploding outwards and throwing both of them to opposite sides of the hall with a deafening crash, incinerating the power amplifying altar in the process.

"You call that a Hollow expulsion potion?" Phoebe shrieked at her youngest sister, watching as the two invincible beings began to recover, "Piper, now! _Now!_" She bellowed, her eyes darting around the room wildly for any sign of her big sister.

The air next to the two sisters rippled as Piper shimmered in with a nameless demon at her side. He was fairly muscular, with tattered clothes covering his body while tribal tattoos ran up his arms. She held out a piece of paper in front of them, and together they started to chant, "Aboleo extium cavium du eternias!"

Almost simultaneously, Diam and Annabelle started to stagger, dropping to their knees and opening their mouths as the Hollow poured from every orifice in their face in the form of a swarm of molecules. The containment box magically lifted its lid, the particles flying back into the infinite light that shone from the inside before snapping shut and locking up the latch.

"Well, I'm sure that was fun while it lasted…" Piper said smugly, surveying Annabelle with a look of suspicion as she raised her herself to her feet. "Uh oh…"

With a primal roar, the blonde threw out her arms, energy ball after energy ball flying from her palms like a fully loaded gun as she released all her rage in the form of this destructive assault. Before the onslaught could hit the Charmed Ones, however, the three of them disappeared in violent flashes of golden light, leaving the demon to be vaporized by the hail of energy balls and become nothing but a pile of ash on the floor. "_Damnit!_"

* * *

Paige wearily made her way down the stairs of Phoebe's house. She had spent the last half an hour sitting silently in her sister's presence, before she had asked to be left alone with her children. The witchlighter let out a sigh, staring out the window in the front door before slowly walking into the living room to find Piper lounging back on one of the large leather sofas, "She wanted to be with just the kids. I thought I should probably leave her be…" 

Piper slowly shook her head in shock, "I can't believe he got a paternity test performed on Faith… One of the most crucial times Phoebe needs him to be by her side, and he has to leave. But I guess it is the pattern with us recently. You had better hold on to Aidan for as long as you can."

"Believe me, I will!" She said with a smile, before putting a supportive hand on Piper's shoulder, squeezing it affectionately, "You're going to get Leo back, you know. And everything is going to end happily. I know it." She said brightly, her happiness fading at the look on her sister's face. "Okay, you got me, I'm extremely worried. And not just about this whole Brennan thing…"

"Yeah," Piper agreed, running a hand through her long locks and staring down at the coffee table with a thoughtful look on her face, "How are we supposed to destroy something that good and evil combined could only seal away?"

Paige looked down at the floor, hesitating with her answer, "I don't know… But we'll find a way. Because for once, the bad guys aren't going to come after us, we'll going to go after them…"

* * *


	20. Lacer Seorsum

_First, a massive THANK YOU to Laur (The-Cheese-Fairy) for beta reading this mammoth of a chapter. I wanted it to be perfect, as this, ladies and gentlemen, is the 100th chapter of my series! Not only that, but it marks the beginning of the end, as we now embark on the final 20 chapters of this story. Anyway, I've talked along enough, enjoy! And remember to leave me a great review!_

**Lacer Seorsum**

Paige's Volkswagen skidded up to the sidewalk, coming to a gradual halt with a deafening screech that made smoke rise from the tires. Surprisingly, Phoebe was the one to come out of the driver's side, hurling the door open and slamming it shut as she barreled around the car, heading for the alleyway, "Paige!" She cried, smacking the hood of the hood of the car, "Move it! Zanral will get away if you don't get off your ass!"

Scowling darkly, Paige got out of the car, feeling a painful twinge in her neck which was usually induced by stress, "Calm down! You haven't missed the last hundred demons we've gone after over the last two weeks. One lousy fire sprite is not going to get _us_!"

"It's hardly lousy, Paige." Phoebe replied, stuffing her hands into her jacket pockets as she power walked into the alleyway with her sister hot on her heels, "Zanral is a Power of Three _demon_." She emphasized, correcting her sister's classification of the being.

"Whoa! Wait! Hold it!" Paige finally caught up to her, grabbing her arm and spinning her around, "You're making us go after a demon that requires the Power of Three? How are we going to make up for Piper on this one?"

"We have those ice potions of yours." She said, pulling out two faint blue option-filled vials that she waved happily in front of her younger sibling's face with a gleeful expression.

Paige narrowed her eyes, "You know, if Piper was here, she'd kick your ass for saying that 'freeze dry in a vial' was her power equivalent." She warned, rolling her eyes when Phoebe merely shrugged and turned back around to keep striding down the alleyway, "She's _so_ been taking power steroids…" She murmured, referring to the amount of premonitions her elder sister had had in the last fortnight, before scurrying down the alley after her.

"Is it me, or is Chinatown becoming a frequent location for our demons these days?" Phoebe randomly commented, her head moving from side to side as she scanned the immediate area for the demon that they were hunting.

"Well, if it was, you would certainly know…" Paige murmured snidely to herself, before addressing her sister directly, "It's always had a high crime rate. I've had a lot of cases that have started out here. Rape, drug addicts… If it wasn't for the amazing potion ingredients and the fact that you've led me down here every second night in the past two weeks, I'd stay away from it altogether!" She exclaimed, keeping a far more relaxed composure than Phoebe, "So, what exactly did you see in your premonition? You know, the one you forced?"

At this, Phoebe stopped to turn around, glaring at Paige with a dark look and arching her eyebrows, "A girl will come out of that door…" She spun around, pointing to a door with iron bars on the front, "Zanral will rise up from the steam from the manhole and swallow her in flames. Of course, you and I intervene before that happens. And FYI, I didn't force this one. I got it when I burnt my finger on the stove making lunch today." She said smugly, turned her back to her sister and crouching behind the dumpster.

It took a few seconds for the witchlighter to get over the shock of her older sibling cooking before she replied, "So you agree that you've been forcing them so you can focus on anything but Brennan?" Paige brought up the subject of her brother in law as bluntly as she possibly could while following Phoebe's example and bending down behind the dumpster.

The middle Charmed One's body visibly tensed at the mention of her husband, "What about him? She asked tiredly, clearly having thought the situation over in her head enough to be sick of it by now, "He's staying at his mother's and I haven't seen him in two weeks. What else is there to know?"

Paige's eyes widened in horror, "Two weeks? Phoebe, his daughter is a month old. You're forcing him to miss out on her growth, and you know as well as I do that they grow like weeds when they're first born!"

"Well, until two weeks, ago, he didn't even think she was his daughter…" She growled darkly, "So why don't we leave the whole thing alone for now, okay?" Her head spun towards the door as someone opened it from the inside, "Quiet! She's coming!"

Sure enough, a young woman came out of the door, turning to quickly lock it before walking in the two witches' direction, oblivious to the fact that there was an orange glow within the plume of steam coming from the manhole behind her. The girl frowned when she felt an unbridled wave of heat hit her back. It was as if a fire had erupted at her heels. She turned around, her eyes widening with terror as she saw a veil of fire rising from the ground, expanding to the entire breadth of the alley and slowly advancing on her as she let out a scream.

"Get down!" Phoebe shouted at the top of her voice as she jumped out from behind the dumpster and hurled a potion vial towards the cloud of bright crackling flames. It smashed against the ground and a bitter, chilling wind blasted outwards with a large frosty mist colliding with the fire and pushing it back with a bestial roar, "Get out of here! Go!" She shouted, jumping forwards with Paige as the girl ran for the street.

The fire began to shrink down into the form of a human shape. This was Zanral's true form, as the Book of Shadows had put it: _The soul of a human that had been so consumed by darkness and rage that it was doomed to spend eternity walking the Earth, wreathed in the fires of Hell._

Paige concentrated on her target, telekinetically sending Zanral into the air, giving it the appearance of a flaming meteor sailing through the sky before crashing into a pile of shipping pallets, instantly causing them to combust into a fierce plume of flames that didn't phase the demon in the slightest as it got up and stalked towards the two witches, raising its arms as they extended like fiery vines, ready to attack the Charmed duo.

Hurriedly fishing into her back pocket, Phoebe yanked the vanquishing out into the open and held it in front of her and her sister, "Force of darkness in our sight, empowered by death and fire's might, extinguished you are by the Power of Three, and banished for all of eternity!"

A haunting screech of agony flew up from the demon's open chasm of a mouth. It raised its flaming limbs to clutch its head in agony before a final gout of vanquishing flames shot up from the ground and consumed Zanral, wrenching him below the surface with a heated explosion of golden sparks.

Paige's brow furrowed in confusion, dropping her hands from the spell and walking forward to the scorch mark that had been left by the demon killing. "… Did we vanquish him?" She asked, kneeling down at the black mark and running her hand over the darkened tarmac, flinching when she felt her fingers get singed.

"I guess…" Phoebe mused, stuffing the spell back into her pocket and looking around with wide eyes, "C'mon, let's get out of here before someone comes out to investigate the noise we just made…" She said absentmindedly, a distant look appearing on her face as she turned on her heel and headed back to the street.

"Where was that caution _before_ we went after the demon?" Paige murmured to herself, before standing to her full height and heading after Phoebe, who was already starting the engine of the car.

* * *

"Did you… get all that?" Edward Young asked his cameraman, dropping the microphone that was emblazoned with a network symbol on each side, "Did you?" He repeated, turning back to the functioning camera with his face a pale white from the shock of what he had just witnessed.

"I think so…" The cameraman murmured, shutting off his apparatus, "Should I just blank the tape? I mean, this is supposed to be a piece on the rising crime rate in Chinatown and-,"

"Blank it? Are you kidding?" Young exclaimed, bending down to pick up his microphone, twisting it around in his sweaty palms with excitement, "I think I've just made my career…" He whispered to himself, watching as the two women got back into the lime green Volkswagen Beetle, completely unaware of his presence.

* * *

Aidan gently rocked his newborn niece in his arms, unable to keep the smile off his face at the adorable faces and noises she was making in her sleep. It was this stage in his own children's lives that he had missed out on. Even though Brennan had done an unspeakable thing, he had been there for both his children from the very start. Being present at their birth, getting them back to sleep multiple times during the night… Whether it had been through ignorant absence to not living with them and Paige, Aidan knew he had missed out on the first crucial month of his children's lives.

He looked up when a car's headlights passed the window and watched as Paige's car pulled into the driveway with Phoebe at the wheel and his wife in the passenger seat. Shortly after, the two witches burst through the door, before instantly moving with a lot more care at the sight of Faith sleeping peacefully in her uncle's arms.

"I really don't see why you're so worried. We saw it blow up with our very own eyes and it didn't reform or anything like that." Phoebe stated, continuing a discussion they must have started in the car, "Thanks, Aidan…" She murmured, gently taking her daughter from the elemental and sitting in one of the black leather armchair of the living room.

"I'm not worried _exactly_…" Paige clarified, sitting down on the sofa opposite from her sister with Aidan, taking his hand, "It's just that there were a lot of flames and it wasn't clear which ones were vanquishing it. It's just usually pretty definitive, you know?"

"What's all this about?" Aidan asked, the only he knew about the subject being that Phoebe had gone after yet another demon and Paige had decided to go along, if only to stop her from self-destructing.

"Paige thinks we screwed up the vanquish." Phoebe said with a smirk, "Is Connor sleeping upstairs?" She asked Aidan, who merely nodded and pointed towards the steps, "Okay…" She rose to her feet, heading for the stairway that led to the first floor of Paige's house.

"I don't think we screwed up!" Paige bleated defensively, "I just have a feeling that this isn't over quite yet…"

* * *

"_Good evening!" Young brightly grinned into the camera, "I'm coming to you from San Francisco's very own Chinatown, where a recent police survey has shown that…" He paused when the camera began to sway a little. He rolled his eyes, "Oh, for God's sake, Ed! What got your concentration this time? A shiny object?" Young snapped viciously at his cameraman, clearly sick of having to do multiple takes._

"_No, that!" The camera flew to the left, focusing on a dark alleyway across the street, except that it wasn't so dark. A flaming figure stood in the crack between buildings, raising its arms and throwing them out towards two women whose backs could only be seen from this angle. A faint chanting was heard over the crackling of flames. The two women were reading aloud from a piece of paper in their hands. The moment the chanting stopped, the flaming figure seemed to scream in pain, before vanishing into the ground._

"_Ed! Ed! Get back to me!" Young urged, looking towards the alleyway in shock as he watched the paler of the two women kneel down on the ground and touch it. "Put the camera down! Quickly!" The shot flew downwards, and for a few seconds, all that could be seen was the cameraman's feet and the sidewalk. "Did you… get all that?"_

_The shot came back to Young, whose face was now showing just how stunned he was. "I think so…" The screen suddenly blacked out. The cameraman seemed to have turned off the camera._

"So, what do you think?" Young asked his boss, Felicity Strong, "I've had Ed put through every test he can think of. It's definitely legit." He quickly ejected the tape from the VCR and gripped it tightly in his hand, paranoia getting the better of him as he was afraid anyone could steal the best thing that had ever happened to his career.

"Who's seen this?" Strong asked calmly, tenting her fingers after carefully placing her cigarette on the tip of the ash tray on her desk.

"You, me, and Ed."

"… And you're sure it's legit?"

"Positive."

She laid back in her large leather seat, folding her arms as she thought the proposition over, "Well, I have to say, this is a lot more exciting than your crime piece… You didn't, by any chance, finish recording that piece on the crime in Chinatown, did you?"

Young cringed slightly, "Um… no. When we got this, I got a little preoccupied and got back to the station to verify it."

Strong surveyed him with a hard eye before smirking; "Now there's a good journalist!" She exclaimed, pointing at him, "Run with it. Air this and put some spin on it. Aliens, freaks, mutants, witches… I don't care. And find out who these women actually are, are who they're claiming to be." She stood up, heading towards the door, "And don't rest until you've blown this story wide open!"

* * *

Paige spun around in her office chair, opening up the filing cabinet and putting in the file that held the details of the latest adoption she had just managed to push through the system recently. She had all these files on the computer of course, but she felt better knowing that there was a hard copy that could be called upon for reference at any moment instead of sifting through virtual folders.

"Um… here are the files from the police department that you asked for…" He assistant informed her, holding a file in her shaking hand as she warily stepped into Paige's office with fear evident in her voice for no apparent reason. What was she scared of?

"Oh! Thanks, Roxy!" The witchlighter responded brightly, taking the file from her assistant's hands before noticing that the woman didn't look as comfortable as she usually did, "Roxy… are you alright? You look kinda flushed. It everything okay?"

Roxy cringed a little, pulling at her hand nervously, "Um… have you seen the news today?"

"No… why? Should I have?"

Wordlessly, Roxy stepped out of the way so that Paige could see the TV in the bullpen of the firm. Whatever was on the screen looked familiar and she had to stand and squint to see it properly, but when she saw what it was, a deep feeling of dread spread through her body and immediately caused her fingers to start shaking, along with the rest of her body.

"_Of course, we can only speculate at this point…"A voiceover said as footage from Zanral's vanquish at the hands of Phoebe and Paige played on the screen, "… but we can assume that Phoebe Halliwell and Paige Matthews are a lot more than just human. We hope to bring you more coverage on these shocking and disturbing events as they unfold, only on Channel Nine News!" _

Paige didn't stay to hear the rest of the report as she had already grabbed her purse from under her desk and was now making her way towards the elevator. She pushed on the down button many times until the doors finally slid apart, allowing her to seek temporary sanctuary in the small, boxy space. "Shit…" She groaned, the elevator doors closing and shutting out the curious and confused faces of her co-workers and starting to move downwards.

* * *

Piper groaned as she let her head fall forward, gently massaging the back of her neck. She had been doing all the accounts for both the club and restaurant all morning, and the barstools of P3 weren't doing a good job of supporting her already sore back. She knew she had brought this pain on herself from not getting enough sleep, but she couldn't bring herself to sleep in the same bed she used to share with Leo. This, of course, had led to many uncomfortable nights on the living couch, and was making her temper shorter and shorter with each passing day.

She looked up to the stairway as she heard the door to the club open and cast light on the stairway, "We're closed!" Piper boomed in a snappy tone, bring her head back up to look at the computer screen once more, rolling her eyes at the spreadsheets and snapping the laptop shut.

"You Piper Halliwell?" A gruff voice questioned. Piper looked towards the source of the sound and inwardly cringed at the sight of the man. He was dressed in the cheapest suit that she had possibly seen, and what was left of his mousy brown hair had been swept over his bald head into an unconvincing comb over.

"Don't remind me…" She quietly murmured to herself, before addressing the man properly, "Yes, I am. What can I do for you?"

"Hopefully, quite a lot. Cid Bugle." He said with a yellow toothed grin, extending a pasty palm in her direction which Piper shook hesitantly, "Does that thing play DVDs?" He questioned with a coy frown, pointing to the laptop.

"Um… Yeah."

He put his hand into his pocket, pulling out a shiny DVD disc, "Why don't you stick that in and give it a spin? I think you'll be extremely interested in what you'll see…"

Surveying the stranger with a look of distrust, Piper took the disc from him and inserted it into the drive on her laptop waiting for it to run automatically, "So what exactly is on this…" She trailed off as the DVD started up, looking at the screen with increasing horror as she watched it play out. Her face had gone whiter than any of the times she had died in the last thirteen years. "Where… did you… get this?" She breathed, her eyes wide with fear and sheer confusion.

"I worked at the gas station where this took place. It took me this long to find you and my…" He looked around the large, empty club, seeming to be sizing it up. "… I'm so glad that I did."

"What do you want?" She growled darkly, taking the disc from the laptop and snapping it in two with vicious anger, trying to resist the temptation to blast the shattered DVD and obliterate it completely.

"That's just a copy. I'm not that stupid." Cid grinned horribly, "And what I want?" He knelt on the side of the bar, locking her in a hard stare as he baited her with the answer to her question, "Fifty grand."

"Fifty _grand_?"

"A year." He added.

"Go to Hell!" Piper spat, getting up off the barstool and folding her arms tightly across her chest, her eye twitching manically as she felt the lid on her anger ready to blow off the top. "Get out…" She snarled, just above a whisper. It was far more menacing than the loudest voice, "Get out now."

"Aw, come on…."

"_Now_…"

"Okay, it's your funeral." Cid warned, holding up his hands in a surrendering fashion and turning back towards the stairs steps with an airy confidence. "I guess I'll just hand over one of the copies to the authorities…"

Piper was ready to retaliate with another venomous slur, but she suddenly found some clarity. Her arms fell from her chest and dropped to her sides, her hands curling into fists as her sudden movements caused her hair to shift, falling down in front of her eyes and giving her a menacing look. "I could find the original. And all the copies."

"Oh, really?" He snorted arrogantly, striding back up to her with his hands on his pockets. His stagnant, smoky breath flying up her nostrils from his proximity. "And how exactly would you be able to do that?"

"The same reason as to why I can do this." She raised her fist, taking in a deep breath as she tightened her curled fingers even more to make her knuckles protrude further before striking Cid in the jaw with a massed out fist. A terrible crack resounded on contact and sent the man flying into a large drum kit on P3's stage, instantly releasing a mish-mash of tinny smashes and echoing booms throughout the club.

Piper didn't stop there. She strode across the expanse of the dance floor and leapt up onto the stage, massing out both of her fists and slamming them into the man's body over and over again. Blood sprayed across her face from a particularly vicious punch to his gut. She ran her tongue along her teeth, tasting the blood that had spurted across her bared teeth. The moment the light smattering of crimson liquid hit her face, Piper snapped out of her murderous assault, raising her hands up to her face. She watched with horror as a thick drop of blood fell from her fingers and onto the shattered shell of a body whose injuries she, with her own fists, had wrought.

She got back up to her feet, realizing that the knees of her pants were soaked right through with blood, "Oh my God…" She murmured, suspecting the blood had probably left two morbid stains on her skin underneath the denim. Turning on her heel, she bolted towards the steps, careful not to place her dripping hands on the railing, throwing one out towards the two halves of the disc she had snapped. They exploded immediately, leaving a delicate sprinkling of silver dust on the floor as Piper left, leaving Cid Bugle beaten and on the brink of death.

* * *

Phoebe laid her head on the sofa, putting a damp flannel over her forehead and slowly closing her eyes, relishing the darkness that was aiding her in the battle against her headache. If she had to be honest with herself, the insanely selfish part of her was wishing she hadn't kicked Brennan out, the only reason being that she was having trouble looking after Faith. Like all newborns, the latest addition to the Halliwell family had been waking up frequently during the night, and was making as much noise as she could about it. Getting up eight times during the night for half an hour each time was beginning to take its toll on both her and Connor. She couldn't fathom how Paige had managed by herself with two newborns!

Her momentary calm was shattered when she heard something at the door. A second later, Brennan had burst into the house, Connor within his arms, throwing his keys down at the door side table. "Okay, buddy. I want you to go upstairs and stay with your little sister, okay?"

"'Kay, Daddy." The four year old responded, scuttling up the steps and slamming his feet loudly on the stairs as he climbed in a fashion most young children did.

"As if I need anything else to add to my headache…" Phoebe groaned, wrenching herself into a seating position and catching the damp flannel as it fell from her forehead, 'What are you doing taking Connor out of preschool?" She snarled icily.

"It's for the best, trust me. It's easier we do it now than when things get even uglier." Brennan said darkly, stepping into the living room, "How could you be so _stupid_?" He exclaimed, looking at her with wide eyes as if she had just washed his prized 78' Camaro with a rock. He had been almost as upset as Connor after the child had realized what he had done to his father's most cherished possession.

Phoebe arched her eyebrows in shock and anger. Not only had he barged into the house and taken Connor out of school early without consulting her, he was also calling her stupid? "Excuse me?"

Instead of responding with the apology Phoebe hoped, for his sake, was coming, he frowned in confusion, "What the hell do you mean? Have you not even seen the news today? It's all over it!"

"I have a migraine the size of Twin Peaks. The last thing I need is irritating news anchors chirping back and forth to one another." She weakly gestured to the windows, showing that they were all covered. "Why do you think I have the drapes shut? Because I'm hiding from the paparazzi?" She said sarcastically, losing her confidence slightly when Brennan didn't reply with a retort of his own.

"Actually… yeah!" He replied, grabbing the remote from the coffee table and switching the television on. "It's been on since like, eight o'clock this morning. They haven't stopped running it. I can't believe you haven't seen it."

Phoebe plopped back onto the couch and folded her arms calmly, not prepared for what she had about to see. She watched with growing anxiety and terror as she witnessed the same footage and recycled commentary Paige had seen in her office. "Oh my God…" She leant forward, her wide eyes glued to the screen as she clamped her hand over her mouth.

Brennan squinted at what was now appearing on the screen. "Are they… pulling up in front of our _house_?" His question was answered after a few seconds when someone began to pound on the front door and hit the doorbell again and again, causing shrill screams to erupt above them, "Mommy! Faif's cryin'!" Connor yelled from the upper level of the house, blissfully unaware of the chaos that was unfolding.

"Uh… Daddy's coming!" Phoebe shouted on Brennan's behalf, "Okay, go upstairs and keep the kids calm. If things get too loud and out of hand, wing a spell and get them out of here. I won't be responsible for my actions if one of those damn shutterbugs shoves a camera in my children's faces."

"Alright. Be careful." Brennan agreed, hesitantly and compassionately brushing his hand over her arm as she passed him. Heaving a large sigh, he turned towards the stairs, taking two steps at a time in his stride as he vanished from the foyer.

Taking a deep breath, Phoebe started to move towards the door, rubbing her palms together and pursing her lips, "Time to face the music…"

* * *

"Get the hell away from me, you vultures!" Victor Bennet bellowed at the various photographers and cameramen that had inexplicably gained access to his apartment building, and were now clogging up the hallway just to get a glimpse at the father of 'Phoebe Halliwell, local celebrity turned media fugitive, and her half sister, Paige Matthews, who seems to provide justice to child abusers _and_ the supernatural!'. Victor grimaced at the memory of how the news had described his daughter and her younger sibling. "Media fugitive…" He growled, walking into the kitchen and slamming his grocery bags onto the counter as a way to vent his anger. He regretted it when he spied egg yolk beginning to pour from the bottom of the bag. "Aw… great!"

"Hey, Dad…"

Victor jumped at the sound of his middle daughter's voice. He turned around, blinking in surprise when he saw that Piper was standing with Wyatt, Chris, and Lorna, each of them having a small backpack on their shoulders with Piper holding onto a suitcase. "Piper, what are you doing here? You shouldn't be just popping into places at a time like this!" He exclaimed, looking down at his two grandsons and the little girl, who had instantly thought of as a granddaughter the moment Piper had told him of Lorna's situation.

"Um… why don't you guys go and play in the spare bedroom Grandpa has?" Piper suggested sweetly, flinching a little as she flexed her hands. Her knuckles had fresh wounds on them from extremely vigorous scrubbing.

Complying with their mother's request, Victor watched as the three of them filed out of the room and vanished down the hallway. His mouth dropped open a little when he saw Lorna shoot Piper a scorching glare of disgust. "What's with the suitcase?" He finally decided to ask.

The eldest Charmed One lay her hand on top of the luggage. "This has got most of the kids' clothes in it. I know this is completely out of blue and for that, I'm so sorry." He didn't doubt it. The pain was evident in her voice. "But I need you to take care of the kids for a while. Something's come up and I have to go."

"Piper, are you sure everything's alright? I mean, with everything happening to Phoebe and Paige, do you think you should leave them without your help?"

A flicker of confusion passed over her face, "What are you talking about? What's happening to Phoebe and Paige?"

Victor's eyes bulged in shock. How could she not know what was happening to her baby sisters? Something wasn't right. "What do you mean? They've been exposed, Piper!" He broke the news harshly, "Some reporter caught them on tape killing this… fire being thing in an alleyway last night. It's all over the news. I've had the media in my face all morning. I'm surprised you haven't."

"What…?" Piper breathed, her voice on the brink of cracking. This couldn't be happening again. Although she didn't have the memories of what had happened the last time they had been exposed, it had sparked a chain of events that had eventually led to Prue's death. "Zanral… Damnit, Phoebe." She cursed to herself. She had found the Book of Shadows open at the page of a fire being, and knowing her sister's current behaviour, Piper could piece together what happened. "Dad, I have to leave. If I stay under these circumstances, someone is bound to dig deeper and find out…"

"Find out what? Sweetheart, you're making no sense! Talk to me." Victor pleaded, moving towards his daughter, only for her to take a step back.

"Please… don't make this any harder than it already is…" Piper bleated weakly, placing her hand on the back of the sofa for the support as she felt her legs would collapse from under her any moment now. "I just wanna see the kids, then I'm gonna go…" She stated, trying to steady her voice so she would sound firm, but her emotions betrayed her and tears began to fall from her eyes as she walked down the hallway, leaving her father completely clueless as to what was going on.

The eldest Charmed One silently stood in the doorframe of the guest bedroom, her children completely unaware of her presence. Wyatt sat on the bed, his back on the headboard, feverishly pressing the buttons of the portable games console that his eyes were fixated on. Chris, who had developed a passion for reading in the past few months, had decided to try and make his way through the first Harry Potter book without any outside assistance. He was doing as well as any sever year old would, pointing out the harder words with his finger, sounding them out, then moving on. Lorna was sprawled out on the floor, her light red hair bouncing over her shoulders as she titled her head from side to side to inspect the crayon drawing she was working on. The crayons in question had already been thrown out askew on the carpet, allowing the toddler to pick the one she wanted with ease.

"Okay, you three. Can I talk to you all for just a minute?" Piper cautiously asked, watching as the trio's eyes all went up from what they were doing to listen to their mother. Obliging, Wyatt turned off his games console and Chris put down his book, both of them sitting on the edge of the bed. Lorna, however, continued to draw, scribbling angrily over something that she had just sketched. "Lorny, could you sit up here for a little while please?"

Lorna looked up to Piper, her normally tranquil blue eyes glared at the witch, making Piper feel a slight chill when she realized the reason for this hostility. She knew. Lorna knew what she had done, how she had beaten a defenseless man to a bloody pulp without a second thought, and how she was now planning on dealing with the situation.

Hesitantly, Piper reached out, putting her hands under Lorna's arms and lifting her up onto the bed. The little girl deliberately went limp in the witch's arms, just to make it harder for her to be carried. The eldest Charmed One managed to heave her foster daughter into the bed in between her sons, before she knelt down before them to try and explain, "Um… Listen, you guys. Grandpa's going to be taking care of you for a while, because I've got some stuff I need to do and it's not going to be the sort of thing that I can just leave you with a babysitter for."

"Mom, what are you talking about?" Wyatt asked. Something wasn't right. In his nine year existence, he had never seen his mother look more worried, and when she was scared, it was time to be terrified. "Why'd you take us out of school early just to come and see Grandpa?"

"It's… complicated grown up stuff." Piper said painfully, feeling the beginning of fresh tears starting to sting at the sides of her eyes as she realized that she may never see her children again. "But I want you to know that I love you all so much and that I'll be watching over you from wherever I am…" She blinked furiously; driving back both her tears and the flood of sadness that was ready to fly loose. "Gimme a hug…" She held out her arms and wrapped the three of them up. Wyatt and Chris reciprocated by putting their arms around her torso, but Lorna just sat there with a blank look on her face, as if Piper's touch made her feel sick. "Goodbye…" She said just above a whisper as she stood up, wiping her eyes quickly before turning on her heel and walking out of the room.

"That was really weird!" Chris exclaimed, "What'd you think Mom's so upset about?" He turned to his big brother, who usually had all the answers to his questions, even if they were false answers Wyatt had just given him for a joke unbeknownst to him.

"I… dunno," Wyatt replied, clambering back over the bed to get his games console before shooting a longing look towards the door where his mother had just exited from, "She'll come back soon, though. So don't worry, Chris." He said, lightening the situation by ruffling his little brother's hair, although secretly, he doubted his own words.

"She's a bad lady…" Lorna said lowly and indignantly, hopping off the bed and going back to her drawing which Piper hadn't really noticed. If she had, she would have noticed immediately that Lorna was drawing the triquetra over and over again in a pale yellow crayon, before scribbling over it with a coal black crayon, destroying the golden symbol.

* * *

"Okay, can we please open those drapes?" Pamela requested, looking up from the morning newspaper that Darryl had brought with him to Phoebe's house, the main article being about the recent discovery of the supernatural in San Francisco. "I can't see anything on this page!" She exclaimed, squinting at the page to the point she looked comical.

"If we open those drapes, _you'll_ be the thing on that page." Phoebe warned, pacing back and forth in front of the covered window as she heard the bedlam that was taking place outside. She could hear the various news reporters talking into the cameras that were undoubtedly in front of them. She could hear the various shouts from frenzied crowd that were only being kept back by a police barrier. Some shouts were insults, some shouts were pleads, and some shouts were just plain crazy. "Where the hell is Paige with the book? She should have been back by now."

"Do you really think that can help you now…?"

"Did you say something?"

"Nope!" Pamela said firmly, leaning up from the newspaper article and running a hand through her raven dark hair, which was looking more and more like Prue's everyday. "I guess it doesn't matter. The dimmest person in my literature class could write better than this slop. Remind me why you work this paper again."

"Now is _not_ the time!" The middle Charmed One snapped, her head spinning away from the window to watch as a puddle of water grew up from her carpet, forming two beings and falling to the floor to reveal Aidan and Paige, the latter heaving the heavy Book of Shadows in her arms, "Finally! What took you guys so long?"

"Trying to find Piper, that's what!" Paige responded with an equally raised tone of voice, slamming the book down on the coffee table and nearly making it tip over. "She wasn't anywhere in the house, which I find really weird seeing as how she told me she has just doing accounts all day. And I don't think she would…" The witchlighter trailed off as a whirring sound outside the house started to get louder and louder, "Please…" She began, her jaw dropping, "… tell me that that is _not_ a helicopter!"

"Why don't we say it's not for now?" Aidan suggested coolly, putting his hands on his wife's shoulders, "If only to try and keep you calm right now." He turned to address the other two witches in the room. "Let's just focus on trying to get out of this disaster, alright?"

"Yeah, one that Phoebe got us into…" Paige murmured with a dark scowl, folding her arms and looking at the floor.

"What was that?" Phoebe challenged, returning her younger sister's glare, "If we hadn't gone after the demon, that girl would have been killed last night. We've always said that an innocent's life was more important than our secret, and now it's being tested. I guess no one can call us hypocrites."

"Oh! Well, thank God we were true to our word. I'll remember that when we're being dissected by 'insert correct government term here' because the fact that we're not hypocrites will be a _real_ comfort!" Paige spat back, seeming to let go of the anger she had been holding in for the past two weeks, "For God's sake, Phoebe! You have issues with Brennan, not the forces of evil! Go talk and…" A creak on the stairs alerted Paige to Brennan's presence at the foot of the stairway. "… Sort it out…" She finished meekly, her voice going quiet.

"Look…" Phoebe began, folding her arms, "The last thing we need is to be turning against one another at a time like this, so let's just… focus on how the hell we're going to get out of this mess; and start trying to fix it. We'll deal with personal issues later…" She said quietly, her gaze flickering to Brennan for a brief moment before walking around the sofa and sitting down. "I'll take book duty."

"Can't you go and appeal to the Elders to get your whitelighter powers back? They would certainly be pretty useful right about now." Pamela suggested, folding over the newspaper in front of her and watching with a half-interest as her aunt flicked through the pages of the Book of Shadows.

Paige shook her head slowly, "I've already tried. Summoning spells aren't working and we're short an orber. Something tells me they're trying to give us the brush off…" She sneered, rolling her eyes at the thought. "I don't really blame them, you know, seeing as how this is the second time this has happened." Her eyes fell to the floor and she took on very solemn expression, "God… I never really realized it until now, but I really miss Leo…"

"Yeah…" Pamela replied mournfully, "He would have known what to do. And if he didn't, he would have searched like hell to find the answer…" She said, the sorrow thick in her voice. "The past six months really haven't been the same without him."

Phoebe was ready to join in on the reminiscing, when the answer hit her like a gunshot to the heart. Her eyes widened and her jaw dropped as the realization washed over her like a tidal wave. "Hold down the fort!" She suddenly ordered, leaping to her feet and excitedly rubbing her hands together, "I will be right back… hopefully." She added, "Spirits guide me to the one I seek, in this time, where the future seems bleak." Phoebe's body immediately erupted in golden lights before bursting apart and fading away in the air, taking her to wherever she had desired.

"Phoebe!" Paige yelled into the air, completely shocked at her sister's sudden urge to vanish into thin air. "Where the hell did she go?"

"Didn't you hear the spell?" Brennan sniggered slightly before cringing a little at the heated glare he got from both Halliwell women in the living room. Both of them clearly had a problem with what he had done to Phoebe, "I'll just… go warm a bottle…" He said in a hushed tone, heading towards the kitchen where Darryl was just exiting after being on the phone with his captain about the current situation.

"I hate to make a bad situation worse, but…" He frowned at the sudden disappearance of the middle Halliwell sibling, instantly letting out a groan as he formed a theory in his head. "Please don't tell me she's gone off materializing in random parts of the city!" He exclaimed, pointing shakily to the place Phoebe had stood in before he had entered the kitchen.

"I'd really like to comfort you, Darryl, but we don't know the answer. So why don't you just give us the bad news so we can have our heart attacks and move on?" Pamela snapped a little, grabbing the edge of the open Book of Shadows and spinning it to her direction so she could look at it. "Whoa!" Her hands flew back from the tome as its pages began to flip in a supernatural wind that only stopped once the book was open at a specific page, "Zanral…" She murmured, reading aloud, "Is this the demon you nixed last night?"

"Yeah, I don't why Grams is directing you to that page."

"Actually, she may have a reason…" Darryl began, his signature cringe forming on his face as he attempted to break the news gently. "We've had reports about a man on fire attacking civilians in the area where you killed that demon last night. We have two officers in the hospital with sever burns to back that up."

"Are these guys reliable sources?" Aidan questioned, "I mean, a lot of cops will do anything for more money. Are you sure a journalist didn't pay them off and give them a few burns to try and flush the girls out?"

Darryl nodded. "One of them is just a part time officer. He's a priest for the rest of the time. He claims the thing he saw was Satan." He said with an ironic smile, "I wonder if he knows how close he actually is."

Pamela let out a moan of disgust, "Great, as if things couldn't get any worse. The whole world is watching our every move, we're under siege in this house, and now we have some attention whore of a demon trying to make a big enough fire to attract every news crew in the area!" She sighed, shaking her head and muttering several curse words under her breath. "What are we gonna do?"

Paige bit her lip. With Phoebe now gone, and Piper nowhere to be found, it was up to her to make the big decisions. Squinting in deep thought, a smirk passed over her lips as she bent down and snatched up the piece of paper that had the vanquishing spell on it. Phoebe had put it in the book as a sort of bookmark. "We're gonna vanquish it properly. You and me!" She said enthusiastically. "C'mon! When was the last time you vanquished a demon like this? And I want you to be honest!"

"… Not in a while." Pamela answered, looking down at the floor with her hands clasped as she thought over the proposal. She stood up, her face hardened into a steely look as she faced her youngest aunt. "It's dangerous, it's stupid, it might not even work, and it has the potential to make things even worse…" She beamed brightly as she finished, "I'm in!"

* * *

Phoebe materialized on the centre plateau of the Elemental Chamber within a swirl of golden lights. The harmonic melody that continuously played in the sanctum instantly brought her calm. She felt at home with the magic that seemed to radiate off the walls and surround her like a warm blanket. She brought herself back to reality as she realized that the demon she was currently gripping by its leathery wrist was trying to break away. "Hey! Would you stop fussing already? I'm trying to help you!" She spat, tightening her grip on the creature's wrist. It was the same being that seemed to stalk her during her pregnancy.

Yanking it over to the edge of the plateau, Phoebe looked down into crystal clear water, the endless depth giving it a rather ominous appearance. "You know, being a demon has made you… demonic!" She shouted with a dark frown, "If you are who I think you are, you'll be fine! This water cleanses souls and renews them!" Seeing that the demon was still putting up a struggle, Phoebe shook her head with a sigh and wrenched on its wrist, "You'll thank me someday!" She shouted as the demon toppled from the plateau and into the murky water below.

Oddly enough, he hardly disturbed the water, gracefully cutting through it smoothly before vanishing beneath the surface. She could see something happening. A brilliant light had burst from where the demon was. It was slowly shifting and changing shape before finally settling on a form. The light faded, and there was a splash of water as whatever it was surfaced.

"Leo…?"

* * *

"You have _got_ to be kidding me…" Pamela deadpanned as she, Paige and Brennan walked into one of the many busy Chinese restaurants that littered the Chinatown area of San Francisco. The loud clattering of pots and pans and various shouts could be heard from behind the large double swing doors that presumably led into the kitchen, keeping the cooking away from the many customers of the restaurant. "Are you sure your scrying was right?"

"Yes! Maybe Brennan drove us to the wrong place…" Paige replied snidely, shooting a glance at her brother in law, who could only roll his eyes at the cheap shot she had just taken at him.

"Hardly. But, you know, if that's how you feel, I can just leave you here. It won't be long before the press catches on to where we are, and Pam's distracting fireworks spell isn't going to last forever." He pointed out; referring to the quick incantation Pamela had created to distract the mob outside the house long enough for them to make an escape.

"I don't see how a demon like Zanral could hide in a place like this. Its appearance isn't exactly subtle." Pamela thought aloud, scanning the area. All she could see was hungry people, eagerly waiting for whatever they had ordered for a late dinner. "Did the book say anything else about it?"

"Well, at the end of the day, it's a soul, and we all know what souls to best…"

"Possession…" Pamela replied, looking onto the crowd now with an air of suspicion.

Deciding that using magic in public didn't really matter anymore, Paige's eyes flipped a brilliant gold as she used her MDS to read the people of the restaurant and find the person that was possessed. She tutted with disappointment when all she saw was the normal type of human soul. There was, however, darkness at the very back of the room. Her eyes reverted back to their chocolate brown form as Paige located her target in his human form. "There." She said, pointing to a waiter at the other end of the restaurant who seemed to be doing absolutely nothing.

"You sure?" Pamela asked.

"Positive."

"Okay then…" The witch responded, taking in a deep breath and cracking her fingers, "Everybody, get down!" She bellowed. The reaction was predictable, everyone hitting the deck and allowing Pamela to blast a cryokinetic mist across the room towards their target. At first, the waiter surveyed it in fear, before he was suddenly consumed in a wreath of fire as Zanral left him, letting the unconscious man drop to the floor with a thud.

The demon expanded rapidly, just like he had done in the alleyway, brushing off the icy attack that had flew from Pamela's mouth. The wall of flames convulsed and pulsed, before a giant fireball flew from the centre, hitting all three of the magical beings and throwing them out of the fragile single paned window of the restaurant. Glass flew everywhere as the trio fell through it and onto the sidewalk, screams from the terrified public accompanying the tinkering of destruction of the fragile surface as they fell to the tarmac.

Not even thinking about the captive audience that was the many people in the street, Brennan leapt to his feet, electricity crackling in his palms before flying towards the fire demon, which had taken on its human shape by now. It remained unfazed by the assault of voltage that pummeled its chest. "Damnit, you guys! The spell!" He shouted, throwing another tesla coil towards the creature in an attempt to buy time for the witches who were still on the ground.

"Force of darkness in our sight, empowered by death and fire's might, extinguished you are by the Power of Three, and banished for all of eternity!" Paige and Pamela hurriedly chanted the spell, looking up at the demon with hopeful gazes as they silently pleaded that the spell would work properly this time.

It did. Magical blue flames erupted around the perimeter of the demon's personal space. The sapphire flames didn't seem to harm anyone but the demon as they coiled around its flaming body, nearly wrapping it in a cocoon of blue fire that slowly closed in on it, obliterating its physical body before completing the job and vanquishing it in an explosion of beautiful aquamarine sparks that gently sizzled on the ground as they fell from the air.

As Pamela and Paige got to their feet, they suddenly became aware of the adoring applause and whistles that now surrounded them. Even people in their cars had stopped in the middle of the road to watch the vanquish and cheer on these mysterious heroes. Unfortunately, a lot of the vehicles that had stopped to witness the events were vans emblazoned with various network television symbols. Reporters stood outside with their cameramen, their eyes dazzling with greedy delight at the 'show' the three witches had just put on.

Slowly putting the spell back into her pocket, Pamela pursed her lips as her face turned a dark shade of red. "I'm getting sick of this…"

* * *

Phoebe and Aidan watched the TV in a mixture of anger and fear. The shot zoomed in to show Pamela's face slowly contort into one of extreme rage, before she suddenly threw out her arm and the shot was suddenly on the dark night sky. _"My God!"_ The reporter shrieked, _"It seems that one of the beings has lost her mind, and is-,"_ There was a scream and a crash, followed by the sounds of what appeared to be the terrified crowd, running for their lives as it seemed Pamela was unleashing a telekinetic tempest on the street. It wasn't long before the screen fizzled out and the shot returned to the newsroom, where both the anchors were in shock.

"What the hell is she doing?" Phoebe breathed, turning the TV off and hurling the remote at the floor, not caring that she stomped on it as she paced around the dark living room. "She's just gone and made things even worse for us! This is a total disaster!" She tried to calm herself down, sitting on the arm of the couch and running her clammy hands through her hair. It was now dark enough to see the various camera flashes from the outside through the sides of the drapes. "It's over…" Phoebe said quietly, no hope left in her voice.

"You can't think like that, and Leo will tell you the same, as will Paige, and Brennan." Aidan said strongly, folding his arms as he tried to think of a solution. "Can't you guys fix this? I mean, you're the Charmed Ones! If anything can change all this it has to be the Power of Three, right?" He asked, a hint of desperation in his voice. "There's a solution to all this, I know it…"

A large cloud of swirling bright lights lit up the dark room as Paige, Pamela and Brennan appeared within the effects of a transportation spell, the glowing sphere spinning furiously before fading away to reveal the three of them. Brennan and Paige instantly let go of their niece's arms. It seemed that she had been brought back to the house unwillingly. "What the hell were you thinking?" Paige bellowed, "The last thing we need is you going all Carrie on live TV!" She resisted the urge to smack Pamela on the back of the head as she passive aggressively folded her arms.

"I'm sorry…" Pamela said meekly, "But you know how my advanced TK is!" She argued, "My anger just gets to a certain boiling point and when it does, the only thing that makes me feel better is releasing the pent up frustration. I have no control over it! It's a part of me, and… Paige?"

Paige wasn't listening anymore. She had turned towards the stairs in complete and utter shock. Leo was casually walking down the stairs, wearing a pair of jeans and a t-shirt that seemed to be a little too big for him. He instantly surveyed the family members he hadn't seen in so long with a beaming smile, making their way towards them.

"Leo!" Pamela and Paige boomed in unison, instantly jumping on the Elder and nearly sending him to the floor with their combined, glad to have someone who might actually know who was going on here.

"Whoa! Take it easy!" He wheezed, feeling more pressure on his rib cage as the two women hugged him. "It's good to be back." He said, smiling, "I just wish it was under better circumstances, and a little sooner. I could have warned you about all of this…" He said in a guilty tone, looking down as Pamela and Paige pulled away from him. "You guys know what the date is today?"

"Um…" Brennan thought it over for a moment before spotting the newspaper lying on the coffee table. Picking it up, his eyes quickly scanned over the date at the top of the page, "October 7th, 2011… Is that supposed to mean anything to us?" He raised an eyebrow, throwing the newspaper back onto the coffee table.

"It should to Phoebe." Leo replied cryptically, automatically leading to all eyes being on the middle Charmed One as she thought the date over, clearly feeling a little bit under pressure with everything looking at her.

"October 7th… October 7th…" She continued to muse over the date before realizing what it meant, and why it was so important to her and her sisters, "It can't be… are you telling me that that has something to do with the hell our lives have become today?... Why?" She breathed, returning to her spot on the couch, "Why should that of all things have something to do with all this?"

"What is it?" Aidan asked, voicing everyone's confusion with just three words.

"It's the thirteenth anniversary of the sisters becoming witches, when the Charmed magic was released back into the world after being sealed away for so long." Leo answered, wisdom radiating from his voice. "The Elders test witches that are stronger than most on their thirteenth anniversaries of becoming witches. It's really an endurance test to make sure they're worthy for the great power that has been bestowed upon them. Whether it's fighting a particularly strong demon, or something else, it pushes the witches to their limits. And only they can put a stop to it."

"… But I've been a witch for ten years, not thirteen." Paige pointed out, her eyes narrowing slightly, "Why am I even a part of this? Shouldn't it be Piper and Phoebe that are getting tested?"

"Doesn't matter." Leo replied flatly. "Charmed magic is thirteen years old. The moment the Power of Three was reconstituted, you became a part of that magic, and therefore a part of this trial."

Silenced by this revelation, Paige joined Phoebe on the couch; the only sound that could be heard was the shouts of the mob that still wasn't leaving, even with it entering night. Phoebe looked down at the floor, her hands gripping around the roots of her hair as she shook her head vigorously. "This is bullshit…"

"Phoebe…"

"No!" She shouted, rising to her feet and glaring at Leo as if he was responsible. "Every single second of the last thirteen years has been a trial. Losing Andy, losing Prue, losing Emma, putting families on hold, having magic constantly _screw_ with our lives…" She took a breath, her anger getting the better of her as raging tears streamed down her face, "So after all the hell we've been through, you're telling that they've decided to name this one _little_ day a _test_? Well, you know what? I'm sick of them thinking that we can't handle the power we have, and that we need to be punished for it. When we fix this, and we will… I am going to vanquish every single one of those sadistic _bastards _if it's the last thing I do!"

Gently taking her sister's hand, Paige pulled her back down to the sofa and put an arm around her shoulders, trying to find the fact that this whole thing was upsetting her also. "How…" She began, her voice cracking from the pressure she was under, "How do we fix it…? How do make things the way they were?"

"The Power of Three…" Leo answered solemnly, "This trial was designed to test all three of you, and only all three of you can rectify it."

Paige snorted at the suggestion, "Yeah, that'd be great, if Piper hadn't vanished off the face of the planet. We haven't had the time or privacy to try and find her, and she hasn't tried to contact us all day… It's actually really weird, now that I take the time to think about it."

"Really?" Leo frowned, a look of worry for his wife, and excitement at the thought of seeing her again. "I'll go and see if I can find her." Slowly summoning his power to orb after having not used it for so long, Leo disappeared in a column of sparkling white and blue lights that flew up through the ceiling.

"I may have a way to do this without Piper…" Phoebe said distantly, Paige still having a supportive arm around her. She stood up, her baby sister's arm still around her, "But you guys need to get out of here. Go to Atlantis until this all blows over."

"No way." Brennan immediately replied.

"Absolutely not." Aidan followed, shaking his head.

"You guys, this isn't about us wanting to deal with this ourselves…" Paige began, "This is about the safety of our children and how they will be the safest with you two." She bent down to pick up the Book of Shadows, shutting it firmly and handing it over to her husband. "And take this with you… If things take a turn for the worst, we don't need that in the enemy's hands."

Brennan and Aidan exchanged looks with one another as the elemental tucked the tome under his arm. Wordlessly giving, Aidan walked around the coffee table to give his wife a tender kiss on the head, "You be safe, alright?" He asked her, looking into her eyes before reassurance.

"Don't worry, I will. You take care of our girls…" She said quietly, gently taking his and for a brief moment before he walked away towards the stairs to retrieve their children, taking them to safety. Brennan shortly followed, shooting a longing glance at Phoebe before slowly going up the stairs to join Aidan in leaving the house.

"I'm surprised you didn't tell me to go anywhere…" Pamela said quietly, not wanting to seem inappropriate after the heartaches that seemed to be floating around the room now.

Phoebe smirked fondly, "Well, putting together your personality, and your stubbornness, I could kinda already guess what your unchangeable decision would be." She took a deep breath, heading towards the door with Paige in tow, grabbing her car keys from the table, "We'll take my car, since Brennan left his in Chinatown." She gave a reassuring smile to Paige, "Its gonna be, okay, honey." She said calmly, seeming to have found a hold on her temper once more.

The youngest Charmed One frowned a little, "Where are we going?"

"To where we're most connected…"

* * *

"This is a complete disaster…" Katrina growled as the stars underneath her unveiled what was currently happening in the world. She angrily waved her hand over the ground, a snarl appearing on her face as the images on the floor vanished. "The Charmed Ones are the only hope this world has, and the Elders are forcing them to jump through flaming hoops like this? Why haven't They intervened?" She turned to the considerably taller creature that stood next to her. It was the same creature that had made Emma aware of her impending death.

"The thirteen year trial is something They cannot tamper with. It's a pact made between the Elders and the Angels of Destiny, which we both know can't be broken…" He replied in his usual gruff voice, "But I can assure you that They are just as enraged about the situation as you are. Maybe even more so."

Katrina shook her head, her top lip curling in resentment for her thoughts, "Well, if They are so enraged, why isn't anything being done to fix it? Something like this is going to tear the Charmed Ones apart, I've foreseen it." She cut him off before he could open his mouth again, "And to save you from asking again, I still see two outcomes to the final battle. Both of which have the same chance of happening." She waved her hand back over the floor, images reappearing within the stars, "Emma is also beginning to tap into her powers. I wouldn't be surprised if she's watching right now."

The demon's many teeth began to show as his lips pulled back in anger, "And why are you not even trying to control your student? She is still learning the many ways in which her powers work."

"You gave me quite a lot of freedom when I was under your wing. It seemed to work with me, so I thought I'd try it with Emma… I'm proud to say that her power easily surpasses mine. But not all things were meant to last, even us, even the stars…" Katrina said sorrowfully, "Everything comes to dust…" She looked down, her eyes glistening a little with tears before composing herself. "She's coming. You'd better leave."

Almost instantly, the looming being faded into the dark sky that surrounded them and was replaced with a column of shining pink orbs that eventually formed the redheaded psionic mutant. "Why… why isn't anything being done? Why aren't you stopping this? Why?" She asked feverishly, her advanced powers reflected her emotions as a supernatural wind blew around her.

"Emma, calm down… There's nothing we can do…" Katrina said gently, going to put her hand on her shoulder, only for Emma to shrug it off coldly.

"I'm going down there. I'll fix it myself." She said firmly, looking down at the havoc of the images as they portrayed Phoebe and Paige to get out of Phoebe's mobbed driveway with the public holding up signs that had some of the most obscure things on them that Emma had ever seen. "I'll go after that demon that killed them first though, I don't want that happening again."

"You're not going anywhere!" Katrina exclaimed, "You were supposed to have learned from your last mistake. You belong here, Emma! You wouldn't be here if you didn't, trust me. Your destiny is done with Earth!"

"Yeah, well, it seems destiny isn't done with the people I consider family, and I'm not going to let this stupid test tear them apart! I'm going!" She began to glow in a rosy pink haze as orbs surrounded her, only for Katrina to grab onto her arm and break her concentration. "Let go…"

"I'm warning you, Emma. This time, it's a one way door. If you go down there for a second time, you'll only have the powers you had before you died, and you will no longer be a Higher Being… Don't do this…" Katrina said with an air of foreboding, loosening her grip on Emma's arm to let her make her own decision.

Her answer came almost instantly, "You can keep my _stupid_ powers…" She spat defiantly, before bursting into a pillar of harsh pink orbs that consumed her before they flew downwards, descending towards her former home and shedding her Higher Being status as she went.

* * *

Piper chewed her lips as she stuffed her small backpack into the overhead storage bin of the bus. It was starting to get more and more frustrating, as someone else had got to it before her, leaving her almost no room for any of her possessions. Deciding that no one was really looking, she shoved her bag in as far as it would go, froze it in place, then slammed the bin shut, sighing with relief as she took her seat.

The whole city had been in turmoil after everything that was going with Phoebe and Paige, with some of the more eccentric residents clogging up every bus out of San Francisco until the eleven o'clock bus to Los Angeles. Piper had jumped at it, even thought it had meant waiting in a dirty bus station for nearly twelve hours with no one to keep her company except a half-completed crossword puzzle.

A deep twinge of guilt went through her as she thought over again at what she doing. If only the people on this bus knew what hid behind the polite she gave to people who caught her eye contact as they made their way to the back of the vehicle. It was at this time she was thankful for the iPod that she got last Christmas, as listening to the sisterly banter of the two people in front of her was pushing her to breaking point.

She was doing this for the good of her family. She couldn't be there when they found out. She knew she wouldn't be able to bear the thought of seeing their faces, looks of betrayal and revulsion smeared across their faces. They would think of her as a stranger if they knew what she had done…

"Sweetie, just dump him! You're far too good for the lowlife."

"I know… but he just always seems to bring me back with those eyes of his…"

"Then stick a fork in them the next time he pulls his puppy dog routine and problem solved!"

"Marlene!"

Joyous giggling followed the lighthearted conversation and Piper swirled her thumb on the touchpad of her iPod, increasing the volume to drown out the chattering from the two girls in front of her that was bringing her to tears for no apparent reason.

Looking for any distraction, she turned to her left, and instantly regretted it. Across the thin isle, she saw a mother holding her child to her chest. The boy's face was a pale green. It seemed like just getting on a moving vehicle set off the poor kid's motion sickness. His mother seemed to be used to it though, as she tenderly stroked his hair with one hand while holding the sick bag open with the other. Chris hated traveling in any mortal way. Piper could remember one camping holiday where he had thrown up all over the car, but had been as healthy as ever the moment he got out the car. Even memories like that were tearing her apart and causing her heart to swell with sadness.

She closed her eyes tightly and pursed her lips, fighting back the tears as trying to focus on the music that was belting into her ears. Finally, there was a jolt, and then a shaking as the bus started off. Piper opened her eyes for a few seconds, seeing the very top of the Golden Gate Bridge and feeling another sharp pang in her heart. They would be crossing it soon, and she would leave San Francisco forever.

Little did she know that her husband was standing atop that very bridge, fruitlessly pulling on his powers and all his strength to try and find her.

* * *

Aidan pushed on the large oak doors of the Atlantian cathedral, the ancient wood groaning from age as they were slowly swung open. Carvings of sea monsters had been etched into the oak, along with a proud carving of Poseidon, repelling the various creatures from the gates of Atlantis. The open doors let moonlight shine all the way along the large centre isle of the building that led up to a large statue at the end of the cathedral.

He took his first cautious steps into the holy structure, his sneakers instantly making a high pitched creaking noise on the marble that echoed throughout the building. The stain glass windows seemed to move when no one was looking. For instance, the largest one at the back depicted former Queen Undine standing in the middle of the ocean with water sweeping up around her as she stared towards the sky. If you were to take your eyes off it for one second, however, she would be looking right at you the next time you looked at it. Aidan smirked; his mother's frosty gaze seemed to be chill everyone but him.

He hadn't been in here since he was a child. It had been for some royal ceremony for which he couldn't remember the details, but he remembered being complete awe at the grandeur of the cathedral, and the beauty of its magical architecture that kept it strong, even in the strongest storms. Strong metallic beams ran along the ceiling, glinting majestically even in the darkness of night with the moon being the source of light. The deep blue marble floor was flawless, no doubt magically tainted to always keep an unnatural shine that never ceased to impress the people of Atlantis.

It was there he saw it, what he had come here for. A giant statue that completed the cathedral's regal atmosphere at the very end of the building, watching over everyone that would sit in the pews. It was a marble carving of Poseidon, proudly holding his trident in the air as a leviathan coiled around him like a willing servant, ready to protect him and die for him if necessary. The eyes of both the statute beings where made from solid sapphire, giving them a life like appearance as they glimmered in the moonlight.

Kneeling in front of the statue, Aidan clasped his hands together as if he was praying. "Please…" He began, his low voice resounding through the entire cathedral, "If anyone can help, you can… Dad…" He pleaded with a hint of discomfort, having never even met the 'man' that was his father. "Give me the power to stop this… Give me the strength to protect the people I love…"

The sapphire eyes of Poseidon instantly shone with an eerie blue glow, as hearing his son's request. Aidan looked up in confusion, staring into the glowing eyes in fascination before he suddenly vanished in a bright blue flash, the resulting shockwave shattering every window in the building with a thundering crash that rocked the walls, leaving no living being behind.

* * *

Pamela paced the living room irritably, her hands on her hips as she let out a large breath, looking at her watch to see how long her aunts had been gone. She couldn't even see the face of her timepiece, due to the darkness of the room, so she decided that, since she couldn't hear anything outside, she would open the drapes and let what was left of the natural light in. She yanked on the chord, the curtains coming apart gently and letting in the cold, man made glow from a street lamp outside. Raising her wrist up to the light, she saw that her aunts had been gone for fifteen minutes, and that she was probably overreacting.

The street was empty now. It seemed the reporters had given up for the day and were probably sitting in their offices, planning on how to spin the day's events. After a day like this, Pamela silently made a vow to herself that she would never become as pathetic a journalist as all the people she had seen outside on that lawn today. It had made her sick, to think that one mistake had trapped her and her family, making them feel like they didn't belong, when all of these people owed them their lives for the many times the Charmed Ones had saved the word over the years.

Turning away from the window with an angry sigh, she decided to go into the kitchen and prepare something to eat. She was halfway across the living room when there was a tinkering of glass. Frowning, she turned around to see that was a small circular hole in the window that had cracks running from the damage in the centre of the pane.

Pamela was about to investigate, but then she felt it. A liquid, thick and warm, pouring from her stomach and pouring into her shaking hand as she looked down in horror at her new affliction. Blood poured from the gunshot wound, her body immediately starting to convulse from shock as all the colour drained from her face, reducing her to a ghostly appearance seconds before she hit the floor.

Men in black SWAT uniforms suddenly began to walk out of the various bushes and hedges in the street. They gathered around the door, where a particularly vicious kick from their squad leader sent the door to the floor and gained them access to the house. It wasn't long before all Pamela could see was red light passing over her sight as they swept her body with the laser sight on their guns.

"Take her in. After her display in Chinatown, she clearly can't function in society."

"Yes, sir. What precautions should we…?"

The voices faded away into nothingness as she lost consciousness, the last thing she remembered being the sickly perfect grin from a man standing above her as he reached to pick her up.

* * *

Paige didn't even bother to look at the scenery rushing past them as Phoebe slammed down on the accelerator, her Mini Cooper going as fast as it could, even though its driver was barely managed to keep control of it. The witchlighter heaved a sigh, deciding to ask the question that had been niggling her mind from the very moment this all situation had unfolded. "Phoebe…?" She asked quietly, like a scared, innocent child, "We're… going to get out of this, aren't we?"

Not taking her eyes off the road, Phoebe could immediately sense that all Paige was looking for was validation, and not what she honestly thought. "Of course we are, sweetie! Leo's going to find Piper, and any second now, he will orb into the back of this car with her and we'll-,"

She never got to finish her sentence. The haunting moan of a horn pierced the silence of the night as the large eighteen wheeler truck slammed into the driver's side of the Mini. The small car didn't stand a chance. It was immediately catapulted across the junction, flying into the air before slamming viciously back down onto the road upside down, sparks flying from the contact between metal and tarmac as the tiny vehicle continued to spin roughly and almost bounce along the stretch of road until it was nothing but a pile of unrecognizable wreckage, coming to a screeching stop on its roof, before the underside burst into the flames, enveloping what was left of the car in a raging inferno in which no one would be able to survive.

* * *


	21. Ultra Violent, Part I

_Sub-dermal governors are something from Mutant X that would "bind" the mutant's powers. They were used a government organization, so I thought it would be fitting for them to be used in this particular situation. And to avoid this question, the organization here isn't the GSA, MX fans. ;)_

**Ultra-Violent: Part 1**

**Three Months Later**

Paige fell to her knees as a lightning fast foot flew into her side, breaking a few ribs instantly with a sickening crack. She barely had time to blink as a fist came flying at her face, causing her to let out a yelp of pain and sniper to the ground with a thud. A familiar metallic taste filled her mouth as blood seeped from her gums. Well, familiar during her stay here. She was sick of the constant injuries, only for them to heal within a few seconds. As if on cue, she felt her breathing beginning to get better as her cracked ribs began to heal themselves, and the blood in her mouth stopped pouring down her throat. This was starting to get tiresome.

"Get up, number three-five-seven!" The cold, heartless voice boomed above her. She heard a gun being cocked. "Now…"

She let out an inaudible sigh as she looked up at the large powerful light on the ceiling. It was hurting her eyes, but it was nothing compared to the torture she had endured over the past two months. Or was it three? In all honesty, Paige had completely lost track of time. She got approximately three hours of sleep a day, and the rest was this Hell on Earth. Taking in a deep breath, she raised her arms above her head, pressing down on the ground with her hands and flipping herself into a standing position facing her opponent.

Fight or fall. That was all that mattered here.

The man was almost twice her size, and Paige had considered herself to be rather tall. He threw out another leg, aiming to slam his foot into her abdomen. With phenomenal speed, Paige caught the man's ankle, twisting it roughly and hearing a wrenching snap as she broke the bone with her move. The large man fell to the ground with a crash, sending a vibration through her. He then used his good leg to kick her ankles out from under her, causing her to hit the floor again.

He lunged at her, but Paige was ready for him. With incredible agility, she latched her near skeletal hands around the man's neck, pressing her foot into his chest and flipping him over herself. Her heart almost exploded as she heard the snap. It was the fifth time she had heard it, but it never ceased to almost tear her insides out each time.

Her opponent hit the floor with an even louder thud than before, but Paige knew that it was because he no longer had any control over his landing. He lay motionless, a bone sticking out of his neck and nearly tearing through the skin. The sight made bile rise to the top of her throat, but she swallowed it and stood up, wanting to rip the soldier's hand from his arm as he laid it on her shoulder.

"You can all learn something from three-five-seven." He said a crowd of people that Paige couldn't see, due to the intensity of the light, but she knew they were just like her: scared, trapped, and alone. "No one is going to hold your hand through this experience, no one is going to come to save you during a fight, and thanks to these…" He roughly turned Paige around so her back was to the others, shifting her hair away from the back of her neck to reveal the sub-dermal governor that was implanted in her spine, "… you won't be relying on those abilities that landed all of you freaks in here to start with!" He turned Paige back around, her face looking completely white. She hadn't eaten in months, and her only source of energy had been nutritional injections that she was given every three days. "Three five seven relied on no one or nothing, but herself." He stared her straight in the eye, looking at her with a mixture of pride, disgust, and fear.

"She is a natural born killer."

* * *

Lauren Creighton gave a dazzling smile to the saddened businessman whose coffee cup she currently refilling. As always, the diner was busy in the morning, with waiters rushing back and forth from the main dining area to the kitchen, bellowing orders at the chefs who usually chose the worst times to rebel. Still, it was all regularly pleasant to Lauren. This place had a lot more life in it than a lot of the places she had tried to get a job. She was happy with where she had ended up.

"You okay?" She asked with a southern twang to her voice, turning to put the coffee pot down and give the man her full attention. The bar was always quiet until after nine, and this guy seemed to need someone to listen to his woes. "I've worked in a bar before, and when someone whose sitting alone orders a forth cup of coffee, it he's got some troubles." She folded her arms, frowning as the man continued to look down at his coffee cup, "I don't charge extra for the conversation if that's what you're worried about!" She said jokingly, making the man smile as he looked up.

"It's… just my wife…" He conceded, laying his forearms on the counter, "Things have been going great! We just got the kid's mid-year report cards, and the grades are up. Everything's perfect for a change! Then, all of a sudden, she turns on me overnight! I'll be surprised if she hasn't thrown my clothes out onto the lawn with the way she's been acting…" He said sadly, "What's a guy to do?"

Surprisingly, a small chuckle of laughter escaped Lauren's mouth, "Well, you should probably remember the special occasion that you've forgot! When a spouse acts like that, that's the only explanation. Let's go through them all…" She cleared her throat, "Her birthday?"

"In March."

"The kids' birthdays?"

"Last month. They're twins."

"Anniversary?"

"Nope, I… Aw, crap!" He smacked his fist off the counter, standing up and swinging his coat around his shoulders with haste, "Oh, God… I'm sorry!" He said apologetically, stuffing his hand into his pocket and producing a ten dollar bill to pay for the multiple cups of coffee he had drank. He was halted when Lauren put her fingers on the bill and pushed it back at him along the counter.

"On the house. Put every penny you have to making your wife happy tonight." She kindly explained, going back to her folded arms position before realizing that she had to start cleaning up after her most recent customer by taking his coffee cup off the bar.

"Thank you. For everything!" The man said with a beaming smile, striding towards the diner's exit with a slight skip in his step as he walked. The sounds of the busy Los Angeles street flooded the diner as he opened the swing doors to leave, rubbing his hands a little from the cold of the January morning as he headed towards his car.

"Sally!" Lauren called to the small browned hair woman at the other end of the bar, "I'm going for my break, I'll be back in five!" She shouted, smiling a little when Sally gave her a nod of understanding before going back to the customer she was currently serving.

Lauren pushed at the door, gaining access to the drop off alley behind the diner. She rubbed her arms slightly in the cold. It wasn't particularly chilly, just a little colder than what she was used to. The young women blew out a blast of air, her cheeks expanding with it as she calmed down from the morning rush of the job. Sighing, she linked her fingers behind her back and sauntered towards the wall and leant against it, running a hand through her deep auburn hair as her shoulders dropped.

White lights began to surround her and she looked towards the sky. Her eyes were the first to change, slowly transforming from a sparkling blue to an inviting brown before the rest of her body took part in the transformation. The tornados of glowing spheres shrunk as Lauren's height changed, her hair changing colour and becoming longer before the lights began to fade away, leaving Piper Halliwell standing in her place.

She couldn't sustain her glamoured form for lengthy periods of time. After around twelve hours, she would revert back to herself. Piper had found a solution to this by consciously shedding her alter ego for a couple of minutes every few hours before changing back, 'resetting' the glamour and starting fresh.

It had been three months since she had left San Francisco. She had expected the news about her sisters' exposure to have reached L.A. by now, but oddly enough, the press had been silenced. Piper was tempted to look into the matter a few times, and every time she had to remind herself that that wasn't her life anymore. Her life was to live under the mask of Lauren Creighton, a waitress in a diner who was from down south. Just a plain, normal girl… With the power to blow things up.

Piper hung her head, her soft brown hair hanging over her shoulders and catching her eyesight. She stared at the colour of hair she now only saw in the shower or at night in the privacy of her rented apartment. The rest of the time she was a redhead. She didn't know why her subconscious had picked that colour for the glamour, but Piper assumed it was some deep rooted emotion after being a mother to Lorna for two and a half years. The moment the image of the little girl's face popped into her head, Piper instantly shoved it out of her mind. Her resolve couldn't weaken on this. It was better for everyone.

Silently, she quickly reverted back into her glamoured form within a tornado of white lights. She reassumed the identity of the red haired young woman that had just helped a man with his marital issues a few minutes ago and headed back towards the door, blinking away the tears that, to Lauren Creighton, meant nothing, but to Piper Halliwell, meant everything.

* * *

Brennan Mulwray awoke abruptly to the sounds of a screaming baby echoing through the room. He sat up in his bed, rubbing his eyes slowly, having only managed to just get to sleep an hour ago. Rough stubble covered the lower half of his face, and it looked like he hadn't slept or showered in days. Wearily rising out of the luxurious Atlantian bed, he began to make his way towards the crib to where the cries where coming from. The marble floor instantly chilled his bare feet as he padded across the room, his eyes becoming wide as he tried to wake himself up.

"Shh… It's okay, baby girl…" He crooned softly as he lifted the wailing infant into his arms, gently rocking her in a robotic fashion as if he had become used to these vicious outbursts from his daughter. "Faithy, please go back to sleep. Daddy needs to get his rest so he can try and find Mommy in the morning…"

That was becoming a lie he was telling himself. That his wife was perfectly fine. Even after seeing the burnt out remains of the vehicle that she and Paige must have been in, he refused to believe that something like a car accident would take down two of the Charmed Ones, the most powerful witches to ever walk the earth. But after three months, Brennan's hope was starting to ware thin. Even with Emma's efforts to keep everyone upbeat, and Leo constantly at war with the Elders to get their help, nothing was easing his pain, and that of his children too.

The twins had it even worse. Both of their parents had vanished off the face of the earth with no warning or explanation, leaving them with only two uncles and a family friend for support while castle servants buzzed around them, acting like Aidan was long gone and that these two little girls were the ones they had to please now. Melinda had thrown many a temper tantrum while her sister suffered in silence, retreating into sitting silently with Lorna and drawing on the pieces of paper the young psionic would graciously give her.

His quiet pleading seemed to work. Faith's soft brown eyes began to droop as she drifted back off into a sleep. Gently bending down to put her back into the crib before lumbering back to his bed, he sat on the edge of the mattress, knowing that he wouldn't get back to sleep now. Deciding to make the most of this early start, Brennan headed towards the bathroom to try and clean himself up for the rest of this hellish day.

"Phoebe…"

* * *

Brennan wasn't the only one having trouble sleeping. Far down the hallway of the large castle, Emma DeLauro slaved over the bubbling potion pot that sat on the small oak table in her current bedroom. Her dark red hair, now cut to just underneath her shoulders, was swept up into a loose ponytail, style not being the objective, only to keep loose strands out of her eyes. "Through time and space this rhyme shall sail, to where the strongest spirits prevail…" She chanted softly, sprinkling an unknown dust into her concoction and watching as the potion bubbled furiously, "… to summon forth a higher being, whose world we are prevented from seeing…" The psionic scrunched up her eyes as she finished the spell, before opening them hopefully. Nothing. The room was the same. "Damnit…" She cursed softly, her head drooping to her chest in disappointment.

"You know, after all the spells you've tried over these last few months, I think that one's my favourite."

Emma jumped with fright and spun around to see Katrina standing behind her, staring at the recently demoted Higher Being with a resolute expression. "You mean you've watched me all this time as I've tried to summon you?" Emma asked angrily, rediscovering her confidence and folding her arms, "Why didn't you come before?"

"Because I wanted to see how long it would take you to realize that you don't have the power to rip people through dimensions anymore, especially something like this. It's requires the Power of Three at the least." Katrina explained calmly, "Most of your spells were barely a whisper in my mind, nowhere near powerful enough to summon me against my will."

"Then what are you doing here now?"

"I'm here by choice," The ancient being snapped, "…mainly because I got sick of hearing your voice rhyming in my head all the time." She too folded her arms, letting out a sigh, "What do you want? If it's about getting you powers back, then-,"

"No." Emma immediately replied in a firm tone, cutting her off. "You can see the future." She stated, walking towards her former mentor, "And I know you've probably been keeping a close eye on this situation, in the present and the future." She got closer, staring into Katrina's dark eyes, "So, I'm asking as a favour… Please tell me where they are. We've been going around in circles for the last three months, and Leo and Brennan have had just about enough." She stated, thinking about the two men who were near their breaking point.

"…You're right. I have been keeping a close eye on the situation, and in the future I saw, you didn't need my help." Katrina frowned a little in confusion, "And I really don't see why you thought I would help you. You went against my wishes for a second time, relinquishing most of your powers, and you let your emotions affect your rational thinking. This is your mess, Emma, not mine. Clean it up yourself." She turned to vanish into the ether, pulling her cloak around her and preparing to leave before a shout of protest stopped her.

"Wait!" Emma ordered, "… I know that you once had a mortal life… mortal connections… And surely, when you became a Higher Being, you still felt an obligation to protect them. These people may not be my family by blood, but they're the closest thing I have. So, please… help me." She pleaded, her voice just above a whisper as she looked down the shiny marble floor.

Katrina seemed to be at war with herself over whether or not to help. Biting her lip, she eventually turned back around to answer her, "Before you became a Higher Being, you were a powerful telempath in your own right. Embrace those powers once again, and you'll find the start of your solution within the walls of this very castle." She pursed her lips, not really knowing what to say, "Take care of your family." She said abruptly, turning on her heel and fading away as her outline glowed a harsh blue.

Emma smiled. It wasn't much to go on, but it was a start, "Thank you…"

There was a knock at her door before it opened to reveal Brennan poking his head in through the gap, looking around the room. "Were you just talking to someone?" He asked, frowning when he saw that Emma was still in the skirt and blouse that she had worn all day, "Have you even gone to bed yet?" He raised an eyebrow as Emma slowly moved in front of her potion pot, looking extremely uncomfortable. "What are you doing?"

Emma sighed angrily as she walked towards the doorway, frowning darkly at Brennan as she passed. "You have to knock _and_ wait for an answer. You don't just barge in to someone's room and think its okay, even under these circumstances." She said coldly, brushing past him dismissively and heading in the direction the library was in, knowing that was where Leo would be.

* * *

Diam stomped through the fine ash that had been left from his latest demon vanquish. He had managed to copy his power of heat vision before killing him, which was just another one of the powers that he and his female counterpart had collected over the last few months. Heaving a sigh, he folded his arms and looked around with an unfulfilled expression on his face, "You know, I never thought I'd say this, but I kinda… miss the Charmed Ones, they presented a stronger challenge than any of the demons we've killed over the last three months."

"I know…" Annabelle said, deep in thought as she sat atop one of the large tables in the Great Hall, "I mean, getting all these new powers is pretty cool and all, but where's the fun if we can't test them on someone who can actually survive one fireball? I mean, that witch we fried a fortnight ago? What a screamer! And it was only her arm that got blown off! I don't see why-," She cut herself off small surges of electricity began to spark from her left hand, damaging parts of the table, "Aw, damn… This skin is starting to come apart again."

The bald man rolled his eyes, "Then just shed it! You don't need to look like the mercenary chick anymore. And in all honesty, Tyola, I'm pretty surprised you kept it for as long as you did. You usually get rid of these essence auras the moment we're done with them."

"Well, I've never had to sustain one for a year. I got comfortable." She snapped back, hopping off the large table and onto the floor, "But you're right. I'll just let magic take its course and let this façade fade away." The surges of magical lightning began to run up both her arms, "Wow, this one is coming apart a lot quicker than the last one. Mind you, this one was kinda rushed, seeing as how that fire elemental interrupted me… Oh, speaking of which, we need to personally take care of them before the Master purges the world. It's their fault that we were sealed and lost five hundred years of-," She suddenly fell to her knees, her whole body lighting up in violent blue sparks that even managed to leave scorch marks on the marble.

"Just ride it out." Diam said in a bored tone, "We've had worse afflictions put upon us in the last few millennia. Don't let a little essence aura comedown get you."

Crossing her arms over her chest, Tyola glowed with a harsh aquamarine light as she shed the form she had worn for the past year. Her form began to shift, and shining golden particles flew up from her body and burst into nothingness as they floated away. Her curly blonde hair suddenly straightened out and became shorter and bushier, taking on a light brown tint. Her face became thinner, her cheekbones protruding attractively from her pale face as her eyes changed from brown to hazy blue that was bordering on being grey. Taking a deep breath, Tyola got to her feet, smirking with delight at being in her true form once again. "That's better…" She gasped, surveying her partner. "Now, what do you say we go and find the Charmed Ones?"

"… Couldn't agree more." Diam replied with a grin, turning on his heel and beginning to walk down the corridor to the large library of magic the school contained, "Can't say I missed that face of yours though…" He chuckled, before receiving a sharp smack on the head from Tyola as she came up behind him.

"Oh, be quiet. And I hope you said your goodbyes to that face, because you won't ever see it again, thanks to where I banished the real Annabelle to…"

* * *

The cloaked woman flipped into the air and edged to the right, narrowly avoiding the troll's massive club as it slammed into the thick snow with a thud. The missed attacked caused the white powdery substance to fly upwards into the hulking creature's face as the woman landed delicately in the snow, the hood of her cloak positioned in a way that covered her face and shielded it from the never ending bitter blizzard that would rage for all of eternity in this dimension.

The troll let out a roar of anger as its slow reflexes finally caught on to the fact that he had missed his target. The nostrils of his flat nose flared as he wrenched his club from the ground and swung it around at the woman once again, only for her to dodge for a second time, bursting into a flurry of particles before rebuilding herself on the other side of the brute. Unfortunately, her timing had been off, and she reappeared just in time to be the victim of the troll's full circle swing with his club.

The tree trunk smacked her roughly, sending through the air so far that the thuggish creature nearly lost sight of her in the blizzard. The thick blanket of snow had broken her fall, but she was still injured, and she struggled to get up from the unstable ground beneath her, stumbling several times before bringing herself back to her full height as the troll advanced upon her, raising his club to make the final swing.

The women threw out her hand, a neon blue energy ball crackling into existence as she opened her palm, sending the projectile rocking towards the brutish creature's face. It connected with his left eye, sending an explosion of blue sparks and blood into the air, the crimson liquid spurting across the ground and tainting the perfect white of the snow as he stumbled around in extreme agony.

This was her chance. She raised both her arms above her head, her hands beginning to shake as she mustered all her magical energy into the space between her palms. Small, stray bolts of lightning flew out from the epicenter of the energy, striking the ground and melting any snow it came into contact with. As the lightning came together, a giant energy ball slowly grew above her head, crackling and buzzing as loudly as a swarm of wasps.

Summoning all her strength, she wrenched her limbs forward, hurling the massive ball of lightning at her enemy, the sphere melting every drop of snow it came into contact with as the white substance continued to fall from the heavens. It collided into the troll's chest, burning away a portion of his sickly green skin from his chest as it pierced his thick hide.

Once the smoke had cleared, all that was left was a smoldering hole in the creature's chest. You could see the grey sky through the gaping chasm that had once held the troll's heart. With one last mighty roar of pain, the giant being toppled to the ground with a thud, sending snow into the air while a hissing sound broke the shrill whistle of wind as the still warm fatal wound hit the frozen ground beneath.

A particularly strong gust of wind blew the woman's hood back, her long, curly blonde hair whipping back in the wind and exposing her face to the bitter elements. Annabelle Hawke's teeth chattered as she pursed her chapped lips, which –like the rest of her face– had turned a frigid shade of blue from the harsh cold of the Snow Realm. Her breathing was laboured. The last fight had taken nearly all that was left of her strength. She took comfort in knowing that she was close to her destination.

Spying a large satchel attached the to the troll's belt, Annabelle's eyes lit up at the prospect of food. She couldn't remember the last time she'd eaten, so as she trudged through the thick snow to her down opponent, she realized she didn't even care what was in the satchel, as long as it was edible.

She yanked at the frayed rope that was keeping the sack closed, finally pulling it open, her eyes dazzling with hunger and delight when her nose was instantly assaulted with the smell of raw fish. Her hands dived into the bag hungrily grabbing one of the slimy fish; looking around wildly for somewhere she could start a fire. If she started a fire, then she'd be able to amplify it to a point where she'd actually want to cool down.

Smiling, she thanked whatever force had guided her over the frozen Bay the previous night, as now she was surrounded by structures that had been built in the main realm's San Francisco. Setting her sights on a small yet sturdy looking house, she loosened the satchel from the dead troll's waist and slung it over her back, starting her journey towards the first proper shelter she'd had in a year.

* * *

Leo Wyatt was sleeping peacefully in the silence of the library in the Atlantian castle. His pillow of choice, 'Everything You Ever Needed Or Wanted To Know About Bunyips', was open at the first page to provide maximum comfort, where a picture of a Bunyip had been illustrated galloping over a knoll. It was probably the most useless book in history, which made it perfect for its current use.

A clomping began to echo through the large library, slowing getting louder as Emma made her approach with Brennan not too far behind, wearing far quieter sneakers. She saw the Elder sleeping peacefully on the book, and a pang of pity spread through her body. "Leo…" She murmured gently, shaking his shoulder, "Leo." She said a little louder, withdrawing her hand as he began to awaken.

"Piper?" Leo called out hopefully, his head flying up from the book as he looked around wildly for his wife. His eyes finally landed on Emma, and he was once again consumed with crashing disappointment. "Sorry… I thought you were-,"

"I know. It's okay…" Emma softly replied as Brennan began to look through the various books that Leo had extracted from the shelves during the night. "Look, maybe you should go to bed. You haven't moved from this library all week, and your kids need you now more than ever to be strong for them." She glanced at her former Mutant X teammate before looking back at Leo, "We need you to be strong too, and you're not going to be if you keep running yourself into the ground like this."

"… I dunno…" He groaned, rubbing his tired face slowly with his hands before they dropped to the table. He gave Emma the sternest look he could muster at this moment in time, "You promise to come and wake me if there's any news? Even the slightest thing? Even if it's just a lead?"

"Absolutely." She said firmly, hitting him lightly on the hand, "Okay, go to bed and get some rest. We'll look over this stuff since we're the ones who have had some sleep." She picked up the book Leo had been sleeping on, cringing a little, "And we'll start by putting this book away!" She said brightly, realizing that Leo wasn't even listening to her as he shuffled out of the library.

"Okay, what's on the agenda today?" Brennan asked, munching slowly on an apple as he lowered himself into a chair at the table, "Scrying? Star charts? _More_ scrying?" He droned in sarcastic tone, staring down at his apple and heaving a sigh.

Emma thought deeply as she put the Bunyip book away. Brennan was losing hope, and she didn't blame him. She wanted to check out the lead that Katrina had given her, but she couldn't do it with him peering over her shoulder. "Actually… I want to check out a few things. Do you think you could maybe hold down the fort here while I go do that? I promise I won't leave the castle."

"Just try to stay in this _life_ and I'll be happy." Brennan said with a hint of sarcasm, before properly thinking about what the psionic had just said, "Wait, hold it." He ordered, making Emma stop in her tracks as she headed for the exit. "Do you have a lead or something?"

She opened her mouth to reply, only to realize that she didn't really have answer for the hopeful mutant, "I don't know yet…" She said cryptically, before going back to her normal tone of voice, turning as she began to leave again, "I'll be back in a couple of hours, hopefully with some good news…"

* * *

Paige stood in a bolt right position in front of Cliff Narcom's desk. Her wrists were crossed behind her back, and she focused her sight on a spot on wall. She refused to make eye contact with the man that had enslaved her and others like her. She didn't even know why she had been called here, all she knew was that this man was the definition of filth, and she didn't want to be around him at all.

Narcom smirked slightly as he surveyed the soldier in front of him. On her black t-shirt, the thick white numbers '357' stuck out wildly against the contrasting background colour of the garment. That's all she was to him. A number. Leaning forward onto his desk, he pulled back one of the metal spheres in a row of five and dropped it, letting it swing down, hitting the other balls and making the sphere on the other end fly up. It was a never ending cycle that sent a small clicking noise throughout the room, "Does this noise bother you, number three-five-seven?"

"Sir!" Paige barked immediately, "It is not my position to comment, sir!" She shouted, having had these mottos imprinted in her mind for the last few months. She had resisted at first, but after two weeks, the endless beatings, electric shocks, and general breach of human rights had been too much. The moment she had conceded defeat, they had injected her with some sort of serum that healed all the wounds that had been inflicted on her by the various soldiers. After that, any injury she sustained in training would automatically heal itself within seconds. But it still didn't make the pain go away.

"Good answer." Narcom replied proudly, rising from his seat and smiling. "Follow me, three-five-seven, there's something I want to show you." He walked past her, Paige immediately turning and going after him. She hated the fact that she was quite curious about what he had to show her, "I think you're gonna like it…"

They walked down the vast corridor, taking so many twists and turns that Paige lost count. They went through various doors that required Narcom to swipe a keycard through a checkpoint to gain access, before they arrived at an empty room with a glass window on the far wall. It seemed that the room on the other side of the glass was bathed in darkness. "Turn on the lights." He said into an intercom next to the window, causing cold florescent lights to flick on in the room in front, causing Paige to nearly lose what remained of her self control.

Phoebe lay in a sterile white bed; a gown of the same colour covered her body. From the parts of her body that were visible, Paige tried to conceal her distress at the ghastly burns that run up her sister's arms and covered part of her face. The middle Charmed One was hook up to many machines, various needles sticking into her skin as they presumably kept her alive. It seemed she couldn't even breathe properly on her own, as her chest was rising and falling in rhythm with a machine that looked like a pump. It looked like she was on the brink of dying.

Paige's bottom lip quivered, and her whimper of sadness was clearly audible over the quiet beeps of the heart monitor in the other rooms, "I'm afraid the serum we gave to you doesn't really work on mutants with her type of ability, so this is about the best we can do for her." Narcom informed her in a tone that was anything but sympathetic. "Does number four-eight- two mean anything to you, three-five-seven?"

Looking through the glass at the frail state of her older sister, Paige had never felt more alone or afraid. Until now, she assumed that Phoebe was on another part of the compound, going through the same sort of training she was, not lying on a bed with machines being the only thing keeping her alive. She was her big sister. Big sisters were supposed to be the epitome of strength to their younger siblings. Paige wanted to smash this glass with her powers, wrench Phoebe from the bed and the machines, and take her home. Everything would be alright if they got home, she knew it. "No…" She whispered quietly, looking down at the ground to cover her tearful eyes.

"What was that?" Narcom asked sternly, his brow creasing in anger.

"No… sir." Paige added, the venom in her voice that she had concealed so well for so long was almost dripping off her tongue.

"Good." He replied coldly, continuing to look at the shadow of a life in the other room. "Go back to your training for the day, three-five-seven."

Almost instantly, Paige spun on her heel and headed for the door just as another soldier was entering. She made sure not to make any contact with him as she passed; knowing that the slightest hint of emotion would give her away. Instead, she opted for speeding past him, nearly knocking him to the floor as she left, silently vowing that she would escape, and soon.

"Have you had any luck in finding the oldest of these sisters? I want to complete my collection." Narcom informed the soldier, his gaze still set on Phoebe's barely alive form through the window.

"I'm afraid not, sir." He replied. "Shall we initiate the back up plan?"

Narcom seemed to be thinking over what the soldier had just said, before nodding his head slowly, "Where is recruit eight-one-nine? I want to check her out to make sure she's ready to go out on the field. I trust all the regular precautions have been taken in a case as rare as hers?"

"She's right outside the door, sir. And yes, multiple samples of D.N.A. have been taken to ensure that even in the unlikely chance of escape, it won't effect our testing." The soldier moved uncomfortably on the spot for a moment, "Now, we've given her the normal amount of enhancers to boost her skill in the field, but I'm afraid it's affected her appearance a little, as she was already extremely powerful to begin with."

"Bring her in and stop flapping your gums already…" The superior agent snarled, turning around to face the open door that three-five-seven had flew out of a minute ago. "As long as it doesn't compromise her in the field, I don't really care." He cleared his throat, taking a military stance, "Enter, eight-one-nine!"

Almost immediately, the person outside responded. Pamela Walker walked into the room, almost marching. She was wearing the same outfit Paige had been wearing, but with her identification number emblazoned across her chest. She looked a lot better than her younger aunt did right now, apart from her eyes, which had taken on an unearthly misty tint. The area around her eyes seemed to bulge as if she had two black eyes, with the veins in her face nearly bursting through the skin around bruised looking area. Even as she blinked, the room seemed to tremble in her presence.

"We had to create a whole new type of sub-dermal governor, and even then it barely suppresses her powers." The soldier informed his boss, "Her vocal chords were damaged during the testing, so she won't be able to speak until they properly heal, but _their_ kind tend to recover from injuries at a quicker rate than normal people, so it won't be long."

"Well…" Narcom began, smiling a little. "… I guess we'll just have to send her after Piper Halliwell until she's ready for proper assignments. After all, if she's going up her aunt, it'll be easier for both of them if she can't speak."

* * *

Paige had been standing in the darkness next to her door for over an hour. She knew it was around this time that two guards would deliver her nutrition shots, her 'dinner'. One would administer the injection; the other would hold a gun to her face just to make sure she didn't try anything. It was imperative that she took both of them out as quickly as possible before either of them could raise the alarm. She'd rather do this with the least amount of fuss and violence if she could.

She heard a bleep outside as a keycard was swiped through the entry point to open the door. As expected, it opened in a way that covered her completely when it was fully open. "Where the hell is-?" The armed soldier was cut off when Paige suddenly pushed violently at the door, causing it to swing back into a closed position, easily breaking his nose and sending him into the corridor unconscious. The other soldier fell just as easily. Paige was careful to kick the syringe out of his hand before delivering a forceful kick to his chest. Not realizing her chemically enhanced strength, the kick broke several of the man's ribs, sending him crashing into the brick wall with such a force that it caused a part of the wall to crumble down on him as he hit the ground. Dead.

Paige would have taken the time to process what she had just done, if it wasn't for the strict time limit she was under. She quickly frisked the unconscious soldier, nearly squealing with glee when she found the controller for her sub-dermal governor. The witchlighter didn't waste any time in deactivating her governor before crushing the controller under her heavy boots, and starting her way towards where her sister was being kept.

It was when as she was about to leave the hallway when she noticed a small panel that seemed to require a manual key. Under it, there was a knob with the words 'Emergency Lockdown Override' beneath it. Squinting her eyes at the keyhole, and activated her telekinesis and smirked when she heard it click into place, before she turned the knob and pressed down firmly.

A loud series of clicks echoed through the corridor as every single cell door was unlocked and opened. Paige suspected that the switch had also shut down the sub-dermal governors, as when a young man, no older than twenty five, stuck his head out his cell, his eyes flashed with a feral amber glow that seemed to rejuvenate his life with energy and excitement. As confused prisoners stumbled out of their cells, they too seemed to feel a weight being lifted off their shoulders as their powers were set free.

"Everybody! Let's go!"

* * *

It was here.

Emma stood in the centre of the bridge that connected two different parts of the castle. The psychic emotional residue from both Paige and Aidan was so thick here that she felt like she could take a tangible bite of it out of the air. She had searched the castle up and down all day, and she hadn't felt such powerful remnants anywhere else. The only place that came close was their bedroom, but even that didn't give the psionic enough energy to work with. This bridge, however, was dripping with psychic energies. They were some of the most intense echoes she had ever felt in her life, and she knew exactly why.

_Paige made a series of gestures with her hands, and slowly the latches began to creek and groan as they were lifted away from the door telekinetically from her power. Once the iron was completely clear of anything that would stop it from opening, Paige made a pulling gesture, making the doors come apart with a groan as the metal was separated. Paige was instantly met with the raging storm outside, getting pounded by rain as she ran out, making more gestures behind her and shutting the iron doors with a bang._

_Her heart skipped a beat when she saw outside. He was standing in the middle of the bridge, his clothes clinging to him from standing out in the rain for so long and his slightly longer than normal hair stuck to the back of his neck and forehead. Immediately, she ran to him, narrowing her eyes so she could see him as he walked towards her. Without any words, she threw herself at him, catching the elemental in a fierce lip lock which was only intensified when Aidan pulled her as close as their physical forms would allow, putting one arm tightly around her neck and putting his free hand on her cheek. Paige moved in as close as she could the warmth his body was giving off, putting one hand on his back and trying to pull him in even closer._

_They finally pulled out of the kiss, still extremely close to each other as their drenched clothes were sticking to each other Paige let out a sob as she buried her head in his chest, "I can't do this! I need you! I can't live without you! I'll die!" She babbled, pulling away and looking into his eyes, "I just can't…"_

"_Shh…" He soothed her, hugging her shaking frame and stroking her wet hair, "I'm not going anywhere, not this time, never again…" He assured her. Paige looked up and kissed him again as if she needed to him just to keep breathing, she felt him return the kiss, and realized that, in the pouring rain, soaking wet, she had never been happier._

Emma smiled as the psychic echoes helped her see the scene in her mind. She knew that leaving that message on her memorial plaque would get to Paige somehow and help her make the right decision in the end. And although neither Paige nor Aidan knew it, events brought on by their being together had saved their family from a lot of future heartache. The psionic would have lingered with the feelings for longer, if thoughts of her memorial plaque and lost loves hadn't made her feel empty inside.

"C'mon, Paige… You help me, I help you…" Emma whispered, clutching Paige's old clown doll, Slappy. Emma had taken it from her friend's house earlier that day, hoping that an object sentimental to the witchlighter would help her focus on strong energies that were connected to Paige. If she could get a reading from Paige from her current location, they might be able to find her; and Phoebe as well. They, after all, were two thirds of the solution to this whole mess, so they had to be found. It was all a matter of concentrating hard enough.

Taking a deep breath, Emma stepped into the very spot Paige had been standing in on that night, in the rain, within the safe embrace of her lover, closing her eyes as she reached for her friend telempathically. The psionic's eyelids flickered as images assaulted her mind. They were fuzzy, yes, but they were the first lead they had had in the last three months, and she wasn't about to throw the idea away because the connection was a little hard to sustain.

_Paige stood in the darkness. Thick, iron chains constricted her entire body, nearly cutting off her air supply, but it didn't faze her in the slightest. She struggled against her confinement, her face turning red with fierce determination as she thrashed wildly, the chains clinking together and echoing in the void. Emma had learned to interpret telempathic visions like this as someone yearning for freedom, who was being suppressed by another being._

_The next part, she had never seen before, but could instantly tell its meaning. Three darkened silhouettes stood just out of Paige's reach. One of them was tall, a man it seemed, and the other two were little girls, each holding a hand of the man that stood in between them. If Paige hadn't been trapped, she would be able to reach out to these people, to cast light upon their faces and be with them once more, but she couldn't._

_Something then happened that Emma hadn't been expecting at all. One by one, the chains began to crumble and Paige regained freedom. The moment the last chain had dissolved in a burst of bronze-coloured rust particles, she flew towards her family in a single bound, towards her home…_

Emma's eyes flashed open as the vision ended. Slappy fell from her hands and hit the stone floor with the quiet thud. Her heart pounded inside her chest, as if it was bursting to get out of her body. Turning on her heel, the psionic made a dash for the doors, running as fast as she could as she shouted, "Leo! Brennan!" She shoved at the large iron doors, ingoing the pain in her arms as she tried to move something so heavy before gaining access to the hallway and bolting towards the library.

Paige was escaping.

Now.

* * *

Paige threw her elbow into yet another guard's face as she twisted his arm violently, hearing a snap as he let out a howl of pain before dropping his gun to the floor. The lights in the corridors had shut down as a consequence to lockdown override switch, and would flash with a red light every few seconds as a screeching alarm pulsed through the entire base. The mutants had escaped.

Everywhere was complete pandemonium. Mutants were taking out their personal vendettas on guards that had caused them an exceptional amount of pain during their entrapment. Now that the sub-dermal governors had been deactivated, guns seemed to pale in comparison to the vast array of powers that they all had on the edge of their fingertips.

The witchlighter hit the deck as a pulse of violet energy passed over her head, hitting one of the many soldiers that were now trying to barricade the exit. The soldier in question glowed with the same lilac light as the magic hit him, before he fell to the floor in screams of anguish. The ferals, whose vision in the dark was so much better than everyone else's, were able to execute the most complicated of martial arts movements, giving a soldier many disabilities within a few seconds. Paige didn't care about any of this though; all she cared about was getting to Phoebe.

Three soldiers lined up at the end of the corridor, each of them preparing their multi-round guns for use. Paige, thinking fast, caused the weapons to fly out the hands of the bewildered military men with just a thought. The guns flew towards her and turned around, before she telekinetically pulled the trigger on all three. The dark corridor flashed as the guns fired off bullet after bullet, riddling the three guards with many mortal wounds that killed them within seconds. They were the last thing standing in her way.

Stopping briefly to wrench a soldier off a struggling mutant, Paige found what she had been looking for. Raising her leg, she planted her foot in the flimsy door, causing it to instantly fly off its hinges and be hurled into the next room. She stepped in, instantly seeing Phoebe lying in the bed, just as she had left her. Baring her teeth, Paige shattered the glass window with her powers and leapt through to the first piece of human contact she had had in three months. "Its gonna be okay, Pheebs… we'll get you to Leo… he'll fix you… you're gonna be alright…"

Not even caring what any of these machines were doing, Paige wrenched the wires out of her sister's body and slung Phoebe's arm over her shoulders so she could support her better as they left through the door in this room. She heard a whimper of life come from her elder sibling's mouth as they made their escape, "Phoebe… Phoebe! Stay with me, okay?"

"Pai… Paige…?" Phoebe breathed out, wincing in agony. She could now feel in the pain her burns and other vicious injuries were giving her in her conscious state, "I'm… slowing… you down… Leave me…" She breathed out, as if she had used all her remaining energy to utter those words.

Naturally, she was ignored. Paige continued to make her way along the corridor. She had no idea where she was going, but she knew that if she stopped moving, she would lose all hope, and that was something that could never happen. The floor was littered with the dead. Some of them were riddled with bullet holes, some of them had unusual injuries on them, and some had no evidence of being hurt at all. Soldiers, mutants… All of them had died due to her actions.

It wasn't over yet. One solider, seemingly unarmed, came around the corner, grinning maliciously as he advanced on Paige. Gently laying Phoebe down next to the wall, the witchlighter brought herself back up to her full height so she could fight. He kept up with her enhanced fighting rather well, dodging her kicks, blocking her punches. Paige didn't want to have to resort to killing him, but if she couldn't knock him out, there would be no other option.

Thankfully, he went down. After receiving a particularly strong punch to the gut, it knocked the wind out of him long enough for Paige to plant her forehead into the bridge of his nose, rendering him unconscious with a vicious headbutt, which left her with a slight case of double vision as she stumbled a little. She had hated trying to do that move in training.

"Hey!" She turned around, her eyes bulging when she saw Narcom standing there with a gun pointed at her face. That sick, pearly white grin spread across his face, "End of the road for-," A loud bang cut him off and his mouth became agape. Paige narrowed her eyes in the darkness, seeing a small channel of blood trickling down the side of his mouth. He had been shot in the back.

Narcom hit the floor with a loud thud, revealing that Phoebe been the one responsible for his fatal wound. She was barely standing, leaning against the wall; a gun that she was barely keeping steady in her shaky hand now fell back to the floor. Paige assumed that she must have grabbed it from one of the many dead soldiers on the floor. It was only a few moments later when she joined them, collapsing to the floor. "Phoebe!" The witchlighter screamed, bolting towards her elder sister and catching her just before she hit the hard surface.

Paige gently cradled her in the corridor, noticing large patches of blood starting to appear underneath the thin medical own she was wearing. She suspected that the ricochet from the gun had sent a strong vibration through her body, tearing whatever stitches she had. "Phoebe… come on, please… don't…"Paige's bottom lip quivered as she could see her sister's life slip through her fingers. This wasn't the way it was supposed to end. It couldn't be.

Suddenly, a bright blue glow illuminated the two of them. Paige looked up, and her heart skipped a beat when she saw a large cloud of orbs descend from the ceiling. She would have jumped for joy, if it had been under better circumstances. As three people began to form out of the blue and white light, she could immediately see that two of them were Leo and Brennan, and for a second, she thought the third was Piper, until her eyes properly focused and her heart skipped yet another beat.

"What the hell?" Paige exclaimed at the sight of her deceased friend, tightening her grip on Phoebe in fear, "What are you doing here? Why are you here? Where's-?" She didn't even know what her next question was. She just couldn't keep in control anymore.

Emma looked up, seeing another firing squad at the end of the corridor. "Leo!" She shouted, "Heal her on the way and let's go!" The three of them bent down around the two Charmed Ones, Leo held his hands out over his sister in law while Brennan gripped Phoebe's hand tightly, praying for her to pull through. Emma didn't waste any time. She latched her hands onto the shoulders of Leo and Brennan, and willed all five of them up into a cloud of rosy pink orbs just as the soldier fired their guns.

* * *

The same swathe of baby pink orbs descended onto the floor of library in the castle of Atlantis. Before they fully formed, a golden glow could be seen within the orbs as Leo put all his power into trying to heal Phoebe. The haze of pink light eventually faded away, but the five of them stayed in their positions, watching intently as the healing glow from the Elder's hands seemed to do nothing. "I can't do it…" Leo said mournfully, pulling his hands away and quietly punching the ground.

Brennan looked at him with wide hopeful eyes, "What the hell are you talking about? You have to heal her! You can't just let her die!"

"We're too late…" Leo breathed, looking down at Phoebe with tears prickling his eyes, "She's… dead."


	22. Ultra Violent, Part II

**Ultra-Violent: Part 2**

Phoebe opened her eyes, and immediately wanted to close them. Her sight was met with the glaring white that she had seen before. It was the endless room of white, where you couldn't even tell where it ended or began. Sure enough, she looked upwards and was able to gaze upon the beauty of the peaceful night sky, where stars stretched across the vast velvety darkness, each one shining like a diamond. She didn't understand what was going on; the last thing she remembered was driving along the street with Paige asking her a question, then… nothing. Was she dead?

"Phoebe Halliwell, you owe me, _big_ time!"

The middle Charmed One spun on the spot where she stood; surprised to see Katrina standing about ten feet away from her. It was probably a lot closer, but with the giant visual deception this place seemed to have, she just couldn't tell. "What are you doing here?" Phoebe asked, frowning, before deciding on another, "What am_ I_ doing here? Am I…?"

"You're getting a reprieve." She answered bluntly. "… You're not supposed to die. Not like this, and especially not at this time!" She shook her head, muttering under her breath, "This idiotic trial almost cost you and your sisters your lives. It was time for us to step in. Hence why you're still alive… or at least, you will be in a few moments." The higher being smiled warmly, "You're better just accepting this for now, with everything you've been through, it's too much for you to process." She looked up, as if someone was whispering in her ear. "Time for you to go! Seek out Piper!" Katrina shouted with a knowing smirk as the magic began to take effect.

Her words became an echo as a bright pool of light opened at Phoebe's feet, letting her drift slowly back into life, where her family was waiting.

* * *

Brennan silently wept as he clung to Phoebe's cooling body. This wasn't how it was supposed to happen. If anything, Brennan had wanted to be the one to go first. That was always how he'd pictured it, with his children and a few of his grandkids at his bedside, and an elderly, but still radiant Phoebe clinging onto his hand as he peacefully moved on. That was how he had imagined their parting. Not with her lying in his arms, covered in burns and slowly soaking through her husband's clothes with her blood.

Pulling his head back from her chest, he surveyed her pale, burned face, gently running the back of his hand across his cheek. She was so cold… He had to have been sitting there for longer than he realized. He looked around the room at other three, who were going through their own ways of grieving. Paige had curled up against a large bookcase, and was quietly letting tears trickle down her face as she stared at her sister's limp form. Leo sat at the large table, his head in his hands. His knuckles were bright red with fresh scarring; he had been punishing himself for not being able to save her. Emma just sat in a trance, staring towards the wall and shaking her head slightly in shock.

Pulling her towards him, Brennan refused to let go. He closed his eyes as he lifted her up a little, not wanting to see the pool of blood that was escaping from one of the torn stitches in her back. He stayed in this position for a few moments, before something made him flinch in shock. Had her arm just moved? His eyes widened ever further when the puddle of crimson liquid at his knees began to slowly shrink and somehow return to the wound, which then knitted itself back up. "Guys…" He murmured, "Guys! She's healing! She's alive!"

Paige's breathing got considerably louder as her pulse quickly, "W… What?" She breathed, instantly scrambling towards her sister to watch as her burns seemed to fade away, leaving nothing but smooth skin. "Oh, thank God!" She choked out, grabbing Phoebe's hand. "Phoebe, wake up, sweetie. It's your family!"

Once all the injuries had faded away, a rush of colour spread through Phoebe's skin and she took the first hungry gasp of air of her renewed life. Her air supply was almost cut off immediately, however, when Brennan and Paige threw their arms around her, babbling nonsense that she couldn't even make out probably, "Guys… breathing is kinda important to me staying this way, you know!" She wheezed.

"What the hell happened…?" Emma murmured to Leo, not wanting to ruin this happy moment for Brennan and Paige by wanting to know the reasoning behind it. She too was happy to have Phoebe back, but it was extremely odd for her to have suddenly resurrected without any help.

Leo couldn't provide an answer for her, shrugging in disbelieve, "… A delayed reaction to the healing maybe…?" He said halfheartedly. He clearly didn't really care about the reason either, and decided to join the other two on the floor to welcome Phoebe back to the land of the living.

Their calm happiness didn't last long however, as the moment Emma joined them on the floor, a tornado of white lights began to materialize to their right. The five of them looked on, anxious about whatever could appear out of the magical tempest. Brennan rubbed his fingers together, electricity sparking between them. He wasn't about to let something hurt Phoebe again. Paige rose to her feet, the enhancement chemicals still strong in her body, so she confident she could defeat anything that would appear. They were ready for anything at this point.

The lights faded away, leaving a person covered in a black cloak. Their immediate instinct was that it was a demon. Brennan was about to unleash a vicious tesla coil before the cloaked being collapsed to the floor, her hood falling from her head and revealing who it really was. While the others all backed away, Leo moved towards the woman, whose long, curly blonde hair was hanging over her face. "Quick! Someone get a blanket! Anything that will keep her warm!" Leo shouted, grimacing at the deep blue the woman's skin had become.

It was Annabelle.

* * *

Lauren covered her mouth as she yawned, her olive skin being illuminated by the light reflecting off the dirty water in the swimming pool of her apartment complex. She had worked a double shift at the diner, which meant the only relaxation time she had had all day was at her one hour lunch break. It was easy work though, as she had had previous experience working in bars, so the time had flown by. Nonetheless, all she wanted to do was get to her apartment, drop her glamour, and go to bed.

She began to climb the steps to the higher level of the cheap complex, and immediately, she could tell something was wrong. She noticed that a few of her neighbours' doors were lying open with the lights turned on. The cautious nature of her previous life getting the better of her, Lauren raised her hands up a little as she approached the first open door.

Her heart skipped a beat when she saw a deep pool of blood coming out of the small kitchen. Pushing the door open slightly, Lauren had to cover her mouth to stop herself from vomiting at the sight before her. The woman, no older than thirty, had been impaled to the wall with every single sharp object in the room. Her eyes were frozen open in terror, and Lauren could only take comfort in the fact that, due to the severity of her many injuries, it had probably been quick for the poor woman.

"Oh God…" She breathed, her voice full of fear. She remembered seeing this woman a few times in the morning, ushering two children towards her car. Lauren scrambled down the small hallway that led down to the rest of the apartment, and instantly, the stench of death assaulted her senses. She didn't need to go any further; she didn't need to see how these children had met a no doubt horrific end.

Scrambling towards the front door, Lauren threw her head over the railing of the terrace that ran around the upper level of the complex, vomiting over the side onto dried out soil below. Who could do something like this? Trying to pull herself together, she brought her hand up to her face and wiped her face, realizing that her clothes were different. She must have shed her glamour without even realizing it.

Piper could hear footsteps coming from her own apartment, which it had also been broken into. She bared her teeth in anger. Whoever it was, she would make sure they paid for what they had done. Raising her hands up in front of her, the eldest Charmed One turned to face her door and began to creep slowly along the walkway, only to stop in her tracks when the culprit came out of her apartment. "Pam…?"

Pamela was dressed completely in black, her dark jeans, her plain strapped top, and her denim jacket concealed the fact that she was covered in blood, the only evidence being that there were small splotches on her hands and her face, which was partially covered up by a pair of sunglasses. But even through the shades, Piper could see the empty, emotionless shell that her niece had become.

"Pam… Did you…? Did you kill all these people?" Piper asked with a raised tone. She didn't get an answer. "Pam, they were innocents! They were _children_! What the _hell_ have you _become_?" She shrieked, looking at her sister's offspring as if she no longer recognized her. Still no answer. "What is the _matter_ with you? Why did you-?" She was cut off when, with a wave of her hand, Pamela sent her oldest aunt off the side of the balcony, letting her crash into the hard cement below, just narrowly avoiding her own puddle of vomit.

Piper struggled to get to her feet, pushing down on the ground only for her right arm to give up and crumple almost immediately. It was broken. Small drops of blood splattered the ground as they fell from Piper's nose. She looked up, seeing Pamela casually walk down the stairway towards her, staring at her through her dark sunglasses as she advanced upon her.

Struggling to even sit up properly, Piper managed to get in a steady position and threw out her hand towards her Pamela, who immediately stopped in her tracks on the last step under the effects of her aunt's freezing power. That confirmed Piper's fears. She really had been responsible for the deaths of all the people in the complex. As she pushed herself to her feet, she saw that the freeze was already beginning to ware off. Pamela's movements were starting to pick up from where they left off, however slow she was going.

A familiar whirring caught her attention and Piper spun her head around to see a swarm of particles coalesce near the gate to the outside street. Her heart sank even lower when she realized that she was in between two forces that, combined, could probably reduce her to a smoking pile of ash with just a dirty look. She frowned when she saw that the woman standing next to Diam was someone she didn't recognize. Had Annabelle been replaced?

"Just the one?" Tyola thought loud, her eyes narrowing a little, "I guess she'll have to do…"She growled, taking a step towards the injured Charmed One, only for a powerful pulse of deep, blood red energy to hit her in the chest, throwing her up against the cobbled wall with a painful thump before she fell to the floor. Tyola, despite her pain, managed to grin, "Thanks!" She said jovially to Pamela, who lowered her hands from their attacking position. The Hollow agent raised her hands in the same fashion, frowning when nothing happened, "What the hell…? Where is her power?"

Diam shook his head slowly, "It's not her power… She's harnessing the power that her kills have brought her, feeding off the energy of the dead. You remember that evil witch in Ireland a couple hundred years ago? You know; the one that tried to strike a deal with us? He could do the same thing."

"But she's not evil."

"Apparently, she is. And if she keeps using the thing she just hit you with, we won't be able to lay a finger on her… Here it comes again!"

Pamela put her wrists together, opening her hands outwards like a blossoming flower before another blast of crimson energy flew from her palms, lighting up her expressionless face with a foreboding red glow. Diam jumped in front of his partner, raising his own hands and erecting a wavering blue shield of light, it being one of the powers he had copied from an innocent of the Charmed Ones. The two powers collided in a flash of purple, the death energy nearly shattering the force field instantly with only a last second magical support from Tyola preventing it from breaking.

Piper could only watch in terror as her niece, the girl would make a joke at every moment she could, took on two of the most powerful beings to ever exist without even blinking an eye under her sunglasses. The eldest Charmed One turned to go toward the complex's exit while the three of them were distracted, but she stopped. She was sick of running, of having to keep up a charade, of looking in the mirror and seeing a stranger looking back at her. No more.

Running towards her niece, Piper laid her good arm on Pamela's shoulder and shook her, the young witch ignoring her completely as she continued to hurl energy, "Pam! This isn't you! You're being made to do this…" She trailed off when she noticed the sub-dermal governor on the back of her neck, "… by this thing…" Piper had saved a couple of mutants over the years, and all of them had had these things in the back of their neck.

Not thinking of the consequences, Piper tried to pull the machine out of her niece's neck. Pamela let out an extremely hoarse scream of pain and lowered her hands, the energy ceasing to flow from her palms as she redirected her arm and dealt a telekinetic blow to Piper's cheek. The eldest Charmed One was thrown upwards, landing on the first floor step and falling to the walkway floor unconscious.

"Let's get outta here…" Tyola said quietly, placing her hand on Diam's elbow and bursting into a swarm of molecules that flew up into the sky and vanished into the inky darkness of the night.

Now that the two anomalies had been taken care of, Pamela turned her gaze to Piper, only to find that she had seemingly vanished from the balcony. She closed her eyes, using her enhanced powers and blood connection to her target to try and sense her aunt. Her teeth clenched when she could sense nothing, along with her fists. She had failed to detain the mark, but she intended not to fail again.

Suddenly, a white burst to life from underneath her shirt. Frowning, she reached inside, finding that the source of the light was a golden heart-shaped locket. She stared at it through her sunglasses, her face not even twitching as she swiped the chain over her head and threw the memento from her neck. The locket landed with a small thud on the hard soil as it flew into a nearby bush. It was still giving off a small glow as Pamela strode towards exit gate, but as the witch got further and further away, the light got weaker and weaker, until it completely faded away.

* * *

"Thanks…" Annabelle said gratefully as she wrapped her fingers around a roasting cup of coffee that Emma had just handed her. She took a sip of the beverage and instantly jerked her head back, grinning inanely, "I just burned my tongue! Do you have _any_ idea how long it's been since I burned… anything?" The blonde looked around the dark expressions around the room, immediately sensing that her happiness wasn't appropriate. "Have I had my life saved at a bad time?"

Phoebe let out a chuckle, "I'm sorry, but are we supposed to believe that you're not trying to kill us? Because a woman who looks a _lot_ like you was responsible for Leo being turned into a demon for six months because he was close to figuring out some big secret of yours." She sat forward, narrowing her eyes as she tried to get a read on the mercenary, "And then there's the fact that I can't seem to get anything from you, which makes me even more suspicious."

"And did you ever stop and think what that secret she was trying to hide was?" Annabelle shot back calmly, taking another sip of her scolding coffee before continuing, "Leo knows me the best out of all of you. He probably knew that the bitch wasn't really me." She looked towards her former whitelighter, "And honestly? I'm surprised it took you half a year to figure it out. From what I hear, my doppelganger was living in your basement. Why would I do that when I have a perfectly good apartment of my own?"

Paige's brow creased in confusion and surprise, "You have an apartment?"

The blonde scoffed a little at the question, "I'm not a mercenary because I enjoy my work. I make a killing! No pun intended. Either way, I get my money and do the world a favour. If a demon refuses to pay up for a job I did for him, he gets to join the guy he sent me after in the first place and I get the money that he was hiding."

"Do you apply the same rule to your _non_-demonic customers?" Phoebe asked drolly, surveying her with an uneasy glare.

"Of course not." She replied immediately, "Humans actually feel gratitude for the things I do for them, so they pay up. And if they don't have the money, they get it to me eventually."

"Okay, I think we've grilled her enough about things like that." Leo stated, shooting Phoebe a warning gaze to make sure she didn't interrupt with any insulting comments. "When were you sent to the Snow Realm? I mean, I'm assuming you had to confront the person that sent you there."

Annabelle nodded, snuggling a little into the blanket she had around her shoulders, "Well, it was right after I escaped the crystal cage your in-laws so graciously put me in after saving me from the Slasher." She noted Paige and Phoebe's looks of shock, "Yeah, that's right. You've met the real me before. No matter how fleeting the moment was. Anyway, I transported myself into an alleyway to get my bearings in peace, when this broad in PVC suddenly appears, kicks my ass, steals my sickle, and throws me through a portal."

Brennan's eyebrows shot up at the blonde's story, "Wow, usually, mercenaries aren't too keen to share the fact that they were defeated in battle. After all, you've built your livelihood around being able to beat the best of the best."

"I'm about to say that it was a close fight, because we all know that if the Charmed Ones haven't got these guys in a year, then I certainly don't have the power to floor one in the space of a few minutes." Annabelle replied, "Anyway, next thing I know, I'm in the Snow Realm. It completely mirrors this world, the only main differences being that there are no people, and it's a constant blizzard."

"How did you escape?" Emma suddenly asked, breaking her silence, "I've read up on the Snow Realm a few times, and it's the perfect place to send someone if you want them to die a slow, painful death."

Annabelle seemed to shiver at her own memories, "I knew I wouldn't be able to cross dimensional borders on my own power. And since I knew I had been banished somewhere near the Snow Realm's very own San Francisco… I headed towards the Nexus so I could draw on the power from it to get back… I could sense its energy even in that world."

"It took you a year to get there?" Phoebe asked for confirmation, seeming genuinely confused at what Annabelle had just told them, "We know you can transport yourself magically. Why didn't you do that?"

"Are you kidding? You've seen how I transport myself. I don't vanish from the plane I'm on. If I were to burst into a cloud of particles for longer than a few seconds, I'd freeze in mid-air. I could sustain a survivable temperature if I stayed in one piece." She explained, "I wasn't about to become a pile of easily digestible chunks from some troll. Although there were a few occasions where I thought that was going to happen…" She said with a sad smirk, thinking of the many battles she had endured over the past year. "I basically had to survive on anything I could find. The trolls had thick hides, so they could go swimming without freezing instantly. If I killed one of them, I could usually find a fish or two. Got water from the snow… And that's pretty much the whole of my sad little story."

The five listeners exchanged looks with one another, deciding that this wasn't really the time to be worrying about the Hollow when Pamela, Aidan and Piper were still unaccounted for, "Um… I set up a room for you when I got your coffee. When you come out of this room, go right. It's the room at the very end of the hallway." Emma told her, giving Annabelle a knowing glance that, if anyone had caught it, they would have known that the two had a past.

"Thank you. It's… Emma, right?" The mercenary replied, sharing a dark look with the psionic before getting up from the sofa, the blanket still around her shoulders. "I think I'm gonna go have a shower. It's been quite a while since I had one of those!" She quipped as she vanished behind a suitcase, the main door closing with a creak that echoed through the room seconds after.

"Okay…" Brennan began, rubbing his hands together from his perch on the arm of the sofa, "So what's our next plan of attack?"

Phoebe curled her legs beneath her before she spoke, "… I think we should try and find Piper…" Her glance shifted when she heard Paige let out a frustrated sigh, "Honey, I know you wanna find Aidan, but if we find Piper, we can fix this mess, and then maybe Aidan will reappear."

Paige bit her lip as she looked at the floor, before swinging her head upwards to look at her sister, "Alright…" She agreed, getting to her feet and taking in a deep breath, "I guess I'll go start scrying for her then…"

"Don't bother." A familiar voice said. Piper emerged from the back of one of the bookcases. Evidently, she had just entered the room from the hallway. Her nose was bleeding, and from the way she was holding her right arm, it seemed to be broken. "I guess I have some explaining to do…"

* * *

Phoebe beamed happily down at her sleeping daughter in the bassinet. She had to resist the urge to pick her up and hold her for all of eternity, but she knew that would probably wake her up, which was something she didn't want to do. "I can't believe how much she's changed…" She whispered mournfully to Brennan, who was watching his wife as she smiled down on their child. "I've missed so much…"

Brennan didn't give her a response. Instead, he walked towards his nightstand and picked up something that looked like a journal, "Well, maybe this can help with that." He handed it to her, watching her perplexed expressions as she flipped through the many photos of Faith, "We both know how fast they grow at this age. So, around a week after you disappeared, I started taking daily Polaroids of her so that, when you came back, you could see how she's grown."

The middle Charmed One looked through the photo album, smiling slightly as she looked upon the many pictures of her children, "Thanks." She said flatly, putting it under her arm and going back to staring at Faith before her head suddenly shot up and she glared at her husband, "You have _no_ right to even be the slightest bit angry at me…"

"I didn't say anything!" He exclaimed defensively, yet as quietly as he could.

"No, but you thought it." She retorted, cutting him off as he went to speak. "And don't even say that I'm invading, because after your breach of trust, how am I supposed to believe a word that comes out of your mouth without checking it psychically?" She heaved a sigh, looking down at the marble floor, "Look, Brennan, you have to just… give me the time that I need. I want to work this out but I can't do that with you backing me into a corner every three seconds, you know?"

By this time, Brennan had moved towards the window, placing his hand on the wall above him as he looked out onto the city that was currently bathed in the darkness of the night. "I…" He began, tapping his fingers on the wall in frustration, "I miss you being around me."

Phoebe had to smile at his confession. She knew for sure he was telling the truth, "I miss you too… But me being in a coma for three months doesn't change how we left things…" She admitted sadly, turning towards the door. "I'm gonna go watch Connor sleep for a few minutes, then I'm gonna find my sisters so we can fix this whole mess. Leo should be done with Piper by now…" She opened the door, light from the hallway flooding into the dark room, "And for what it's worth…" She looked down at the photo album in her hands before holding it up, "I know that you did this for a mother who hasn't seen her child in months, and not for a scorned wife for who you'll do anything to tug at her heartstrings so she'll take you back. I appreciate that…" She turned to leave, heading out into the hallway.

"I'm sorry." Brennan suddenly blurted out before she could entirely, "I'm sorry…" He repeated, turning around to face her back as she exited, "… for what I did…"

"… I know you are."

* * *

Paige pushed at the heavy door of the Atlantian cathedral. Normally, she wouldn't have even thought of coming here, let alone telekinetically undoing all the locks so she could gain entry, but Sandy wouldn't stop scratching at the door, and she knew that the residents of the city would think ill of the Queen being outside, walking her dog, at three o'clock in the morning. "I swear, if you do your business in here, I will make you pick it up with your own paws." The witchlighter warned her pet, wagging her finger in the canine's face. Sandy merely cocked her head and continued to drag her owner inside.

She had never told anyone this, but Paige had always hated churches and cathedrals. It wasn't that she had anything against the various religions that were practiced within them, but the moment she stepped into one, a sinking fear of abandonment would take her over and she would want to leave immediately. It seemed appropriate in her current situation with Aidan, however, so she wrapped more of Sandy's leash around her fist and continued walking.

Oddly, Paige didn't seem to get the same feeling of loathing here. She felt safe, protected, as if she was in the embrace of someone that could shield her from all harm. "Sandy, slow down!" Paige hissed, smiling when the dog slowed down at the very top of the cathedral and sat obediently at the edge of the front pew, as if she was inviting the witchlighter to sit down. She obliged, plopping down onto the wooden bench and sitting in the silence with her eyes closed, enjoying the calm feeling that she was experiencing.

"They say that, for some people, prayer is a sign of a person's desperation."

Paige jumped and spun on her seat, her heartbeat calming when she saw Emma standing in the aisle with a warm smile on her face, "I wasn't praying…" She said firmly as the psionic sat down next to her, stroking Sandy's glossy tan hair as she did, "But if I was, could you happen to tell me who or what I'm praying to?"

Emma chuckled, "Nice try!" She absentmindedly scratched Sandy behind the ear as she stared at her friend, trying to figure out what was going on her head without using her powers. "So… what are you doing here in the early hours of the morning? If you're going to break into anywhere, you could have at least done it at a jewelry store or something."

"Are you kidding? I'm the King's wife! When people see me come into a store, they throw free stuff at me. I've never had to pay for anything here." She looked away from Emma's soul bearing blue eyes and towards the empty sapphires of the Poseidon statue. "I just thought I'd take Sandy out for a walk, since I don't want to wake up the kids and I've missed my dog. Besides, we can't do anything until Leo and Piper have caught up with each other, so I thought I'd get some fresh air while I mull over the fact that my eldest niece has become a raging murderer."

Emma looked down at pew as Paige brought up that subject, thinking back to what Piper had told them about she had saw, "Look, you guys are going fix it, alright? We know it's not really her. This is Pam we're talking about! She doesn't have the ruthless conviction at requires to kill children, or anyone for that matter. She'd sooner take her own life than do that."

"Yeah, that's what I'm afraid of. Her actions will be erased, but her memories won't, and I don't think she'll be able to live with what she did." She looked up the statue once more, shaking her head angrily, "God, I wish Aidan was here right now…" She whispered. "It would make things _so_ much easier…"

Emma placed a hand on Paige's back, rubbing it gently, "Maybe it's time you took up prayer." She said with a bittersweet smile, sensing the pain that her best friend was over what she had heard about Pamela, and the pain of abandonment that she had felt more times than any one person ever should in a lifetime. "Whoa…" A sharp empathic jolt made her body tense up and she pulled her hand away from Paige's back. "What…?"

She could sense an extreme amount of emotion fueled energy begin to build up within the walls of the cathedral. A gentle wind swept around the two women and the dog, Sandy letting out a low growl as she too seemed to know that something wasn't right. The tall windows of the building rattled in their new panes, having just been repaired after a mysterious event a few months ago. There was a harsh flash of blue light, causing Paige and Emma to duck in fear as the windows shattered once again, the thundering crash of the windows blowing out of the panes, then the high pitched noise of glass raining down onto the marble floor.

Aidan stood in front of the statue, wearing the same clothes he had when he had first disappeared. He looked no different, apart from the otherworldly aquamarine glow that his eyes were giving off. Paige had to look away initially from their brightness, before realizing who was standing in front of her. "Aidan!" She cried, dropping Sandy's leash and running at her husband, wrapping her arms around his torso and frowning when he didn't reciprocate the hug. "What is it? What's… up with your eyes?" She asked, her instincts warning her something wasn't right.

Gently, Aidan gripped Paige by her arms and pushed her back a little. She couldn't tell if he was looking directly into her eyes, but she guessed that he was, as it certainly felt intense. He slowly brought his hand up to her face and softly brushed it over her cheek, "You pain shall vanish." He said firmly, speaking with a voice that dripped with age and ancient wisdom, before another bright flash of blue swept him away from the scene, leaving his wife in a mixture of relief and shock.

* * *

Leo run his hand up Piper's arm, a bright golden glow exuding from his palm as he healed the broken bones. He moved on to her nose afterwards, holding his hand in front of her face and making her shut her eyes from the intensity of the healing light. Once the blood had sped back up her nostrils, the two sat silence on the edge of the bed, just enjoying each other's company.

This didn't last long, as Piper finally let the river of emotion she had been holding back for so long flow. Her bottom lip quivered, and she lunged at her husband, weeping into his shoulder as he pulled her into a tight embrace, "This has been a nightmare…" She whispered shakily, "Why did you have to come after me in the Hollow's crypt? I've missed you so much!"

Leo sighed, tightening his arms around her shaking body and inhaling the scent of her hair, "I've missed you too… You have no idea how many nights I spent sitting in the bushes, watching you guys sit down to dinner with that fake Annabelle, all the while knowing there was nothing I could about it…" His anger rose as he thought of Tyola, before calming himself, "I just had to settle with attacking her at every possible opportunity. I wasn't about to let her get away with what she had done."

Piper shook her head slightly as they pulled out of the hug, "But why didn't you try and contact us? We would have figured it out a lot sooner and this whole thing could have been avoided!"

"I couldn't take that chance that you guys wouldn't figure it out." Leo explained, looking down at the bedspread. "I knew that you and your sisters' first instinct would be to vanquish me. That's why I tried to get Phoebe on her own. With her powers, she had the best chance of realizing it was me… Although, the more I was in that form, the more demonic I became. That's why I attacked you at the hospital with Brennan and Phoebe." He ran a hand down her face, smiling fondly, before pulling her in for a long, tender kiss that the two of had needed for so long. "So…" He asked with a large grin on his face, keeping his hands on her face and cupping her cheeks. "Where have you been for the past three months?"

Piper opened her mouth to answer, only for the door to their bedroom to suddenly open to reveal Paige. Her cheeks were reddened from running it seemed, "We have a bit of a situation! Library, now." She shouted, not even realizing that she had intruded on an intimate moment before vanishing just as quickly as she had come.

The eldest Charmed One let out a sigh as her youngest sister left, "It's never just a _bit_ of a situation…"………

Pamela slowly climbed the steps towards the attic, her footsteps not even making a sound on the usually creaky floorboards of the old Manor. She was finding that her concentration was breaking slightly in this house. As if something in her mind was burrowing to the surface. She ignored it, however, and continued to ascend to the house's top level.

She didn't know that Piper was here for certain, but it seemed a logical place for her eldest aunt to transport herself to. This was her home, after all, no matter how much she tried to hide it underneath a pathetic glamour. Nothing was a secret to the young witch's eyes with all the power coursing through her body.

She stopped. Her ears twitched. She could hear breathing coming from the attic that was now just a few steps away. Deciding that she wouldn't be caught off guard again, Pamela gently closed her eyes and extended her will into the room up the steps. Calling upon her now highly advanced cryokinetic abilities, she began to force the temperature in the room down at an alarming rate, smirking when she saw a thin slate of ice creep under the door and onto the flight of stairs she was standing on. No one could survive in the climate she had created.

Blasting the door into a pile of sawdust with just the power of her mind, she strode into the room, confident that she would find Piper dead, incased in a block of ice. What she saw, however, couldn't be processed by her controlled mind. The person in the attic had survived her ice assault. The room itself hadn't been so lucky, with a thick layer of ice covering everything and letting off a thin mist that clouded her vision, but she could still see who was standing there.

"You cause pain to the loved one of this vessel." Aidan said robotically, flexing and causing all the frost that had formed on his body to fall to the floor. "I shall end that pain." He was raised his hand to attack, but suddenly exploded in a haze of bright blue light due to Pamela having the quicker draw with her hands.

Stepping forward, she expected to find some evidence of her victim's demise. When she didn't find anything, this confused her robotic way of thinking once again. With her enhanced powers, no one would be able to survive a blast like that. What was this thing she had engaged a battle with?

Thanks to her newfound gift of intuition, she turned around and saw Aidan standing in the doorway, his expression a mixture of clarity and fury as he slowly walked towards her. "You dare to challenge my will?" He asked angrily, stopping in the centre of the room when Pamela raised her arm and trapped him in a telekinetic vice grip. "Stupid… little… girl!" His body glowed a cold blue and he repelled the trap, sending waves of telekinetic energy through the room that smashed all the ice, all the windows, and sent Pamela to the floor, her body cut viciously from the many chunks of sharp ice that had now made a tornado around Aidan, protecting him.

"You defeated yourself the moment you tried to use my own element against me…" Aidan said, the hundreds of ice shards spinning faster around him as he spoke with incredible power. "You cannot hope to survive!" He bellowed, before every single piece of ice flew towards his target with every intent to eviscerate her.

Pamela was able to raise her hands just in time to deflect the icicle assault with a telekinetic shield which she erected with just a second to spare. They flew back towards their master, either impaling themselves in the wall, or shattering as they pounded off Aidan's magically strengthened body and fell to the floor like stardust.

She raised herself to her feet, and the two stared at one another across the attic. Pamela's sunglasses had been blasted off her face during the pulse of telekinetic energy, and her misty eyes were now narrowed in anger. Her sub-dermal governor sparked from the sudden fire of emotion that was now burning through her body. It still however, had enough control over her to keep instilling her main order: to destroy anything or anyone that got in her way.

She raised her hands and a violent stream of deadly crimson energy exploded from her palms just as Aidan raised his hands and met his combatant's assault with a similar stream of dark blue energy. The two pulses collided in the center of the room, sending a deep lilac shockwave through the attic and shattering any ice that remained in the room. Random streaks of magic flew from the epicenter of the fight, one bolt firing off and hitting the Book of Shadow's pedestal, vaporizing it instantly.

The two powers continued to be at war with one another, and slowly, Pamela started to drain her magical reserve. The areas of her face that had bulged around her eyes began to shrink down at her body started to return to normal. Her eyes became clearer as the magic pouring from her hands began to fade. The red stream of energy suddenly vanished, and all she could do is blink as Aidan's attack hit her in the chest and threw her across the room, pinning her to the wall.

Pamela could feel her ribs cracking as the energy took away her breath. She wanted to scream out. A spell, a hex, a plea for help, anything! But her voice had vanished, and every time she thought she had found a breath to speak, she felt an agonizing burning in her throat. Her vision began to darken, the last thing she was able to focus on being a cloud of lights appearing right next to Aidan, and faint chanting, before she finally lost consciousness.

"We call upon the mortal ways, and gods who guide but may not stay, we seek those of divinity, to separate from and set them free…"

* * *

"Leo, would you just heal her already?"

"How do we know she won't attack us the moment she wakes up?"

"I told you I deactivated the governor. She's back to normal now."

"Yeah, it's lucky my whitelighter powers came back when they did, or we would have been right on time for you killing my niece!"

"I'm sorry! I didn't have any control over what I was doing!"

"Guys! Shut up! She needs healing, now!"

"Leo!"

"Alright!" The elder finally snapped, clenching his hands into fists before holding them out over Pamela's chest. A bright golden glow shot from his hands, and the young witch's midsection began to rise once again as her ribcage was repaired. "I hope you guys are right about this…" He breathed, unwittingly repairing her vocal chords in the process before she took a gasp of life.

Pamela blinked a few times, trying to focus her sight on the seven faces looking down on her. Her aunts, her uncles, and Emma all staring at her with hopefully gazes before they realized she was awake, "We're all dead… aren't we? That's why she's here." She deadpanned, pointing up at Emma, who merely laughed.

"No, sweetie!" Piper chuckled, sitting down on the sofa and helping her niece into a sitting position, "We're all alive. Including her…" She smirked at Emma, who could only smile at the feeling of all of them being together once again. How it had started, and how it would hopefully continue.

"I… remember…" She said distantly, trying to think back into her memory before pointing at Aidan, "We tried to kill each other…?" She said, narrowing her eyes questioningly before she got a nod of confirmation from her uncle, "And…" She put a hand on her forehead, before her face contorted in horror and anguish, "Me… that family… I killed them all… Oh my God!"

"Hey, it was _not_ your fault, okay? That wasn't you!" Phoebe said firmly, sitting on the edge of the back of the sofa and taking her niece's hand. "Trust me, a sub-dermal governor can make you do anything. You're not to blame. Do you think we would have healed you if we thought you could kill someone?" No one noticed Piper shift uncomfortably on the sofa as her sister spoke.

"And don't feel guilty." Paige added, standing at the bottom of the sofa in the library, "We're going to fix it, and it'll be like that woman and children never came into contact with you at all. Everything will go back to normal… I promise." She said solemnly, gripping the arm of the sofa tightly.

"Speaking of which…" Piper began, standing up and walking over to Paige, Phoebe joining her so that all three Charmed Ones stood united once began, "Let's go and show those asses Up There that they can't put us through anything that we can't handle!"

* * *

"Okay, are we sure this is going to work?" Piper asked, trudging through the crisp leaves that littered the ground of the forest which was dimly lit by the rising run. She remembered walking through this very clearing just over twelve years ago when she, Prue, and Phoebe had been the Power of Three, "I mean, our anniversary has passed, so haven't we missed the window of opportunity?"

Phoebe shook her head slowly, "This place has a connection to the cycle of nature, and our anniversary also has a connection to the cycle of nature. Put those two connections together and we'll have the power we need. Plus, you know, we have the Book of Shadows with us this time, so that'll give us a boost too." She stuffed her hands into her pockets, her breath swirling in the cold January morning.

"Is that it?" Paige asked, pointing to a stumpy stone pillar in the middle of a baron part of the forest. "God, this thing is heavy…" She sighed, shifting the Book of Shadows under her arm once again to try and put it into a manageable position.

"That's it." Phoebe replied as they circled the altar. Some of the offerings that people had brought from the autumnal equinox still stood on top, except most of it was fruit, and had nearly rotted to nothing thanks to harsh weather. "No! Don't!" She yelped as Piper went to clear the altar from its rotting fruit, "It'll help, especially since it's connected to the equinox."

Paige cringed as she set the book down on top of the remnants of food, her jaw dropping in disgust when she heard a squelching noise as it was all crushed under the weight of the tome. "Okay, ladies…" She began, holding out her hands so that Piper and Phoebe could take them, "I think it's time we got our lives back, don't you?"

The two elder siblings nodded their heads before all three of them joined hands around the altar. They stood in silence for a few moments, their eyes closed as they tried to centre their power and call upon the Power of Three. Simultaneously, their eyes flashed open, and they began to chant the first spell in the Book of Shadows. The first spell to ever be cast by a Charmed One. The spell that had given them their powers and had started them on the road they were now on. The road to their true destiny.

Everything was right again.

* * *

"C'mon… Where are you?" Pamela hissed as she shuffled through the bush, looking around for the locket which she had lost the previous night. She distinctly remembered it glowing as she stood at the bottom of the stairs, but after that, she just couldn't remember what she had done with it. "Aha!" She boomed triumphantly, coiling her fingers around the chain of the golden locket. "Gotcha!"

Her celebrations were distracted when the sound of two children fighting caught her ear. Pamela looked up, and instantly turned white when she saw the family that she had murdered, all fit and healthy. The two kids were chasing one another as they made their way into the complex, while the mother walked slowly behind them, struggling with her grocery bags while shouting to her offspring to slow down.

The sound of paper tearing echoed through the narrow passage the woman was walking through as her grocery bag tore from the weight, sending her groceries all over the ground. "Oh, no…" She sighed, putting her hands on her hips as she put the other bag down the ground and buried her face into her hands.

"Let me help you." Pamela offered brightly, opening the gate and going towards the woman. "And herein lies the dilemma, paper's good for the environment, but pretty weak, and plastic's… well, you get the picture." She joked as she bent down to pick up the various groceries that had spilled out.

The woman laughed slightly at her attempt to make her laugh, "Thank you…" She breathed, bending down to do the same thing, "I should have been holding them from the base, but then the kids started running around and I wanted to make sure they didn't do anything stupid…"

"Oh, I'm sure they're fine. I think they're waiting outside your door to let them in though." Pamela chuckled, putting everything she had picked up into the bag and placing her hand over the large tear, "Do you want some help to your apartment or are you fine from here on in?"

"Oh, no, I'll be fine." She replied cheerily, walking through the gate, "Thanks again!"

Pamela smiled slightly, looking down at her feet guiltily, "You're welcome…"

* * *

Annabelle smiled widely as she took the first step into the apartment she hadn't seen in a year. The large bay window that stretched across the full expanse of the living room gave her a beautiful view of the Golden Gate Bridge as it was bathed in the morning sunlight. She took in a deep breath before letting it out and smiling fondly at the room in front of her. She was finally home.

She was lucky that she owned this apartment, as if she had been living in it under a landlord, she wouldn't have had any place to go after vanishing for so long. This didn't help when it came to the contents of her kitchen, however. Annabelle suspected from the smell that everything had gone past its expiration date. Her suspicions were confirmed when she opened the fridge to be greeted with the pungent stench of rotting cheese. The only thing that was suitable for digesting was a bottle of flat soda, with an expiration date of the year 2014.

With a sigh, she reached for a dusty glass on the shelf above her, rinsing it, before pouring the flat Cola into it. She took a sip, and immediately spat it out into the sink, the rest of the glass's contents soon following. "Note to self: Go grocery shopping before being trapped in the Snow Realm for- Whoa!" She jumped as she exited the kitchen, staring at Emma who was casually sitting in a large leather armchair with a tall sickle leaning against it.

"Nice place." Emma said brightly, clasping her hands and looking around the large living room.

"It'll be even nicer once I've got rid of the year old dust and when you're out of my chair." Annabelle spat back acidly, "Whatever you've came to say, I really don't want to hear it. So, thanks for dropping by my property. You can just angelically orb away now before I plow an energy ball into those baby blues." She growled, sitting down on the sofa across the psionic.

"I need you to stay in the Charmed Ones' inner circle." Emma admitted, crossing her legs over one another and surveying the blonde intensely, "They need all the help they can get to fight the Hollow, and you're going to be an asset to them in the future."

Annabelle's eye twitched angrily, "You're kidding me, right?" She sat forward, glaring at Emma, "You come to me in a dream a few months before I was banished and tell me that very same thing. The moment I try and put my infiltration plan into action, I get ambushed by some reject from the Matrix and spend the next year of my life in sub-zero hell. So get out, now." She got to her feet and stormed towards her bedroom, shaking her head as she went.

"What if I could tell where the demon that killed Patrick was? Would you consider it then?" Emma coyly suggested, pleased when Annabelle stopped in her tracks and turned back around to face her, "I could tell you where it is, right here, right now. I'll give you this sickle and you could go vanquish it."

The mercenary folded her arms tightly across her chest and slowly walked back into the centre of the living room, "You tell me where that demon is right now, with no strings attached. Then, _if_ I decide to go get in with the Charmed Ones… you help me find Cameron." She said lowly, watching as Emma's eyes widened. "He's the only thing I have left. You help me find him and we have no problems and a clean slate."

Emma smiled at the proposition, "I can do you one better. I can probably get the Charmed Ones to help too, and what's better than having the Power of Three on your side?" The two sat in silence for a few moments, before the psionic spoke again, "Deal." She said firmly, grabbing the sickle and throwing it towards Annabelle, who caught it expertly, "Demonic market. It's in the powers section. You'll recognize it instantly, I'm sure."

Annabelle looked down at her sickle, running a finger over the intricate carvings in the metal handle before turning the empath, who was still sitting in her chair, "You'd better not screw me over this time, Emma, because I certainly won't disappear as easily as I did last time…" With that, she promptly burst into a cloud of particles that flew towards the window, a deep and powerful vengeance now consuming her heart…


	23. A Place Called Home

_I don't mind telling you guys that I absolutely HATE how this chapter turned out. I hope you enjoy it anyway, and for you Phoebe fans, although she isn't in this chapter, she and Brennan are the primary focus in a couple of chapters to come._

**A Place Called Home**

Pamela gritted her teeth as she tried to put her key in the lock once again. She gripped the door handle and shook it vigorously, before kicking the door angrily. Her key wasn't working. She brought up her set of keys to face again to make sure that she was using the right one. She had one for her car, one for the Manor, one for her old locker at Magic School, and one for the apartment. Each one was very different from the other, so she was positive she was using the right one.

Deciding that there must be yet another thing wrong with this faulty door, Pamela placed her hand on handle, and twisted slowly, telekinetically undoing all the docks behind the handle that stood in her way of entry. She smiled when she heard a series of clicks and the door swung open. "Success!" She took her first steps back into the apartment, only to find that it had changed drastically.

The first thing Pamela noticed was that the bowl they kept the household fund in was no longer filled with money. Instead, it was filled to the brim with potpourri that gave the living room a lingering smell of flowers. Their old oak table that sat between the kitchen and living room also gone, and had been replaced with an extremely modern glass table. Now that she thought about it, since she technically had to break in, and now she didn't recognize anything, was she even in the right apartment?

Her worries were put to rest when Jordann suddenly came through the open door. Her eyes narrowed into slits and went completely golden brown as she sensed for an intruder, before noticing that Pamela was standing at the kitchen counter, "Pam…?" She breathed, dropping her purse at the door and staring at her friend in shock.

"Hey, Jord, I think we can catch the six thirty showing tonight and still manage to avoid-," McKenzie cut herself off as she barreled down the hallway and into the apartment, her reaction was nearly identical to Jordann's as she halted herself in the doorway, standing behind the feral and staring, "Oh my God,"

"Did you guys redecorate or something while I was gone? Because the whole place just seems different. I mean, I can adjust to the table, but the money bowl was a good system!" Pamela cried theatrically with a smirk on her face, "Miss me?"

Jordann walked into the apartment with McKenzie following afterwards, closing the door over as she entered and walked slowly into the kitchen area, rubbing her hands nervously, "Uh… Yeah." She replied, putting her arms around Pamela hesitantly and smiling slightly as they pulled apart. "How… did you get in?" The mutant asked with a smile that seemed a little forced.

"Well, you know me, I have my ways… Wait, did you guys… change the locks?" Pamela frowned, stuffing her set of keys back into her coat pocket before scanning the room once again. The potpourri, the glass table, the fact that there seemed to be no evidence of her ever living here, it all began to make sense. "You… got a new roommate?"

McKenzie's face reddened with discomfort as she walked towards the counter, picking up a key with a tag attached to it by a piece of thin string. "We didn't have a choice…" She admitted sadly, walking over to her friend while Jordann nervously looked to the floor. "We got this letter that said you weren't coming back, and since I don't make as much as you, we couldn't survive the way you and Jordann did before I came… We needed the money."

"So you just _moved_ me out?" Pamela said, her rage building, "Did not even seem strange to you that I had just left all of my stuff here? Stuff that I wouldn't just leave somewhere! I've been held against my will for the last three months. Had my basic human rights violated, had my free will taken away… You have no idea what I've been through just to get back here!" She shouted, looking between the two of them, her eyes darting manically, "Somebody, say something!"

"The letter, which was written with your handwriting, said that you'd come back for your stuff one day." Jordann immediately replied, stepping forward to join the conversation and taking the key that McKenzie was holding. "… So, we put all your stuff into storage. You know that place a couple blocks down? Well, it's all there. Even Arc. Although we had a hard time explaining him to the removal guys." She smiled slightly, trying to make Pamela laugh and recoiling when all it did was make her angrier.

With considerable rage, the Halliwell snatched the key from her friend's grasp and stormed towards door, "Thanks for nothing, you guys!" She shouted venomously, slamming the door viciously as she left and managing to knock over a vase that was on a table near the door.

McKenzie sighed, taking off her scarf and throwing it angrily towards the sofa, "Do you feel like the world's biggest bitch?"

Jordann nodded slowly and sorrowfully, "Completely."

* * *

Paige threw the front door open as she entered the house, a chilly winter breeze flying through the entire ground floor before she shut it over with a slam. She threw her purse into the living room, before wincing at the amount of noise she had made. Aidan was upstairs, trying to sleep off a nasty bout of the flu. He had managed to contract it by going swimming in the lake at Camp Skylark in the middle of January. Paige had warned against it, but she had just got splashed for her troubles. 

Her guilt faded away when Aidan walked out of the kitchen, holding a wooden spoon in his hand while using the other to secure the thick blanket around his shoulders. The elemental's eyes widened when he saw his wife, and he immediately hid the spoon around his back, "What are you doing home?" He asked in a raspy tone, the alterations his blocked nose was having on his voice apparent.

Paige ignored his question, and narrowed her eyes into suspicious slits, "And just what…?" She began, sauntering towards him with a frown, "… are you doing that spoon?" She asked, staring into his darkened green eyes before suddenly snatching around his back. "Aha!" She said, grabbing the spoon and smelling it, "Chicken noodle soup?"

"I'm sick of toast…" He said sadly, looking to the ceiling with a sigh.

"But you're not keeping anything else down! We tried cereal yesterday, so what makes you think this will work?" Paige retorted, looking down at the spoon which had obviously been used to stir the soup which was simmering in the kitchen. "Oh, fine. On your own stomach be it," She groaned, handing the utensil back to him and walking into the kitchen, plopping down at the table.

"You still haven't answered my question." He said, sniffing loudly as he shuffled back into the kitchen after his wife, shivering slightly. The house was at a perfect comfortable temperature, maybe even too warm, but Aidan's fever had his body thinking otherwise. He had still resisted the urge to put on more layers though, staying in boxers and a t-shirt and knowing that if he cooled down, he would start to feel warm again.

"Um…" Paige bit her bottom lip, running her hand through her thick chestnut hair before letting out a moan as her head hit the kitchen table, "I got fired!" She cried sadly, her head flying upwards and sending her hair askew. "Effective immediately. I even have the contents of my desk in a box in my car. 'Paige Matthews: Social Worker' is no more!" She shouted theatrically, throwing her arms up in the air.

Aidan eyes widened in horror, "What?" He exclaimed, before wincing at the pain in his temples that had been caused by raising his voice in his condition. After pouring the hot soup into a bowl, he made his way over to the table, sniffing loudly as he sat down, "Okay, tell me what happened? He said warily, taking a spoonful of the creamy soup into his mouth and scrunching his face up as it burned his mouth.

"Well, you know how I got a new boss a couple of mouths before all hell broke loose, right?"

"The guy you said was the biggest bigot to walk the earth?"

"Yeah, _him_." Paige snarled venomously, amazing her husband with how much hate she could put into one word. "Well, this morning, I watched him turn down _another_ black couple down for taking in a foster child. The kid's white, not that it should matter, but apparently it did." She rolled her eyes, "So, before that devastated couple got into the elevator, I invited them into my office and pushed through all the necessary paperwork. They were shoe-ins for foster care, and had already gone through all the stuff that takes months, so I took them down to the orphanage to pick up the boy, and when I got back, au revoir career!"

"What? That's ridiculous! We'll sue that asshole for all the firm has!" Aidan shouted, again regretting at the momentary headache it caused.

"No. I don't want to do that." Paige said, shaking her head. "Despite the management, the firm does a lot of good, and it would put tons of my friends out of work. I've seen the figures; the city doesn't give enough to the department for it to survive a lawsuit unscathed. Besides…" She began, cringing a little, "That wasn't all I did."

Aidan's angry expression instantly dropped, along with his eyelids, "I knew it…" He said, taking another slurp from his soup, pleased that he wasn't feeling nauseas, "Did you lose your temper at him or something?"

"Kinda…" She replied cryptically, "See, when I got back from the orphanage, he immediately started trying to crucify me for what I'd done, saying that the husband I had just helped had a criminal record. I tripped him up by reminding him it was for stealing a pack of gum when he was fifteen… I don't remember much, but I was shouting, and I must have got a little carried away with my hand gestures, and… I kinda… bitchslapped his wig right off his head." She watched as Aidan tried to stifle a laugh, before nudging a little on the arm, "It's not funny!" The witchlighter scolded, letting out a small sigh, "What am I gonna do?"

Aidan clamped his hand over hers, smiling and sniffing, "You're going to go into the living room and start up the fire while I go for a shower. The steam will clear up my nose a little. And by the time I come downstairs, everything will seem better… Well, I'll seem better."

Paige managed to smile through the whirlwind of emotions she was in the centre of, "Fine… Although I'm limiting your closeness to the fire, we don't need your fever getting any worse." She warned, squeezing his hand as he made his way out of the kitchen and towards the stairs.

"You worry too much, you know?" Aidan croaked with a roll of his eyes as he left, still sniffing and coughing as his wife mused over what he had just said, picking at her lip a little before looking down at the floor.

"Maybe _that's_ my problem…"

* * *

"Did the band's manager take our offer?" Piper questioned down the phone as she sat at the kitchen table, which was covered with various spreadsheets and bank account details from both P3 and Thyme. The witch's face lit up, "Excellent! Okay, book them in for tomorrow night, and tell them we may want them back in a fortnight… Alright, thanks, Marshall." Taking the phone from her ear, Piper smiled as she hung up, getting to her feet and beginning to pack away everything that had to do with the club. 

Her attention was diverted when a column of bright blue lights descended from the ceiling, depositing her husband in the middle of the room within a swaddle of orbs. He looked down at the table as Piper cleared up the uncharacteristic mess she had made in the first place. "So you're finished here then?" He said with a smile on his face, placing his hands on the back of a chair at the table.

"Yes!" Piper replied enthusiastically, slinging an arm around his neck and hastily kissing him on the lips, "Now all I need to do is wrap up this restaurant stuff and I'll be done for the rest of the day." She smiled at him before going back to the paperwork on the desk. "Where'd you go anyway?"

"Up to the other Elders." He replied, "I wanted to talk with him to see if they had any leads on the demon that held you in the Underworld for the last three months. They can't seem to think of any demon that would be powerful enough to contain you for that long. Are you sure you don't remember anything about what happened?"

"Uh… nope!" Piper responded in an upbeat tone, avoiding her husband's eye contact, "Like I said, I was pretty out of it for the most part. What do you want for lunch?" She asked with a sweet smile, her happiness fading when her husband looked away from her in deep thought.

"Maybe he's in the book. Have you checked?"

"Yes… Leo, I-,"

"Phoebe could try and get a premonition, or Emma could read you…"

"Would you please just-,"

"I'm gonna go down to the Underworld and see if-,"

"I _killed_ someone!"

This sudden confession seemed to shock Leo out of his in depth thinking, and into a tense silence that hung in the air like a foul stench. His brow creased in confusion as he tried to make sense of what his wife had just said. "What… what are talking about?" He managed to breathe out eventually, staring into Piper's eyes as she tried to avoid his gaze, "Piper…?"

"I… wasn't kidnapped by a demon, and I didn't leave the kids with Dad because I thought it was after me…" Piper finally admitted. She hated to admit, but it felt good to begin to share what had happened in the last three months. "I killed a man…" She whispered. "I used my powers to fabricate evidence, eradicate evidence…" She added with a dip in her tone, clearly not proud of what she had done, "I'm a murderer."

Leo couldn't even form the words to express what was going through his head, before something clicked in his mind and set his heart racing. "Wait… the guy you…" He trailed off, not wanting to say it and therefore admitting to himself, "Did it happen at P3? You conjured fake security tapes to make it look like a street gang broke in and beat up the guy with sledgehammers, didn't you? There was a report sent to the house because it happened on our property."

"Um… yeah." Piper replied quietly, sitting down at the table, "I figured the damage a sledgehammer does to someone would be around the same as a massed out fist…" She said meekly, her voice betrayed her as it went croaky as she spoke.

"Did you take care of his memory?" Leo said with a sudden urgency and darkness in his voice that shocked Piper and, to an extent, scared her a little.

"His memory? Leo what would be the point in-?"

"Did you take care of his memory?" The Elder repeated, gently grabbing his wife's arms as he knelt down to her level. "Please, Piper, tell me you took care of his memory and wiped it of what you did to him, and whatever he knew to provoke what you did to him. If you didn't, then…" His voice faded into a small murmur, not even finishing his sentence.

"Then… what?" Piper asked, clearly perplexed at her husband's sudden rush of fear, "Leo, he was dead. A corpse can't exactly tell the police what happened!"

"No, but a man that survived your attack and is slowly recovering from the brink of death can!" He retorted, shaking his head with an angry sigh when she still didn't understand what he was saying. "He's alive, Piper. Cid Bugle is alive."

* * *

"I mean, I get why they had to do it, but they could have given me a little notice, you know?" Pamela continued to talk as she shook a small packet of sugar, before ripping it open and pouring it into her coffee. "I've been staying at Piper's for the last week while things got sorted out. I left them messages saying that I was coming home, and they just blatantly ignored me… Well, as far as I know anyway. And it's not what they did; it's the way they did it. There's a reason why I keep things hidden in my room, it's because I don't want people seeing them, you know?" She let out a small groan, stirring her sugar into the coffee, "Oh, who am I kidding? Of course you don't know, you're a gargoyle, for God's sake." 

Arc sat on the other side of the table in the booth, his mismatched wings spread out to their full span after spending a month in a storage facility. He was quietly chewing on a plate of rocks as his mistress rambled on, which he knew she had a habit of doing. "Well, that may be so, Miss, but I have learned a few things about your roommates while you were absent. They truly did struggle with the idea of removing your belongings from your chambers. I do believe Miss Jordann doubled her workload just to afford the landlord's toll."

Pamela looked down at the swirling golden brown froth that was forming on top of her coffee, almost losing herself in its mesmerizing qualities. This café was cleverly hidden from mortals, and only really accessible for magical beings. Pamela had found it one night while on the trail of a demon, and had ended up getting sidetracked by the wonderful coffee. "But still, don't you kinda hate them for stuffing you in that small, dark room for a month?" She looked towards the counter, where a beautiful young woman with thick blonde hair was arguing with an ogre over what he had to pay. "Knave! Can I get a muffin when you have time please?"

"Coming right up, Pam!" The nymph shouted back in response over the usual rabble of the diner, "Look, I don't care if you could crush my skull with your bare hands. If you don't pay, you have to work off your debt in the kitchen." The ogre stood up with a growl, looking down on Knave, who had a severe height disadvantage. "Grind your teeth all you want!" Knave shouted, "Now, get in the back and start scrubbing some dishes with those skull crushing hands of yours!"

Arc shook his head in response to Pamela's question, "They didn't force me to go with your belongings. I chose to. If I couldn't protect you, I could at the very least, guard the items you hold dear." The gargoyle politely lifted another pebble and chucked it casually into his mouth. It reminded Pamela of how Keith would eat Popcorn Chicken from KFC. He'd survey it for a few seconds, before throwing it into his mouth, and usually missing.

Her eyes widened as the memory sparked something in her. Keith. What was even going on with him? She hadn't seen him since she had rushed out of his apartment on the morning the day of her aunts' exposure, the last image of him being his back as he turned over in his bed, still sleeping, as she snuck out of the bedroom, not wanting to disturb him. "Um… do you know if Keith dropped by the apartment at all?"

The gargoyle shook his head as he swallowed his 'food' before speaking, "No, Miss. I'm afraid not."

"Not even _once_?" Pamela exclaimed, before their conversation was interrupted by Knave setting down a muffin on a plate, and a brown paper bag, "Uh… I didn't order anything to go, Knave." She told the nymph, pointing at the bag that was secreting a rather pleasant aroma.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I just figured that since you're back, you'd be able to give it to that guy that came here looking for you a few months back." The nymph explained, waving her hand at the door, "He came in here a while ago, asking for you. We told him that we hadn't seen you, but he comes back every day for his lunch. He said he liked the way I cut the tomatoes. Pretty charming guy, if you ask me."

"Can you describe this guy? Did you get a name?" Pamela asked, finding it odd that someone had come here to find her.

Knave her shook her head apologetically, "No name I'm afraid, but he seemed around your age. Maybe a little older. He had this brown hair that looked like he needed a brush, and these amazing blue eyes that would just stare into your soul." A cold wind blew into the café as the door opened. "Oh, there he is now."

Pamela looked towards the door and her suspicions were confirmed. Keith walked into the diner, breathing on his hands while they were cupped around his mouth before stuffing them back into the pockets of his suede jacket. He was just like he remembered, apart from the fact that it seemed he had cut his hair to a normal length, making his glowing blue eyes stand out from his handsome face even more. The mutant casually scanned the large space, his eyes finally landing on her and making her wish she could just vanish. Keith stared at her for a few moments, before eventually walking over to the table, being greeted by a smile from Knave. "Hey! Chicken and tomato sub, just how you like it!"

"Thanks." He said coldly, taking the paper bag from the waitress with a forced smile before setting his eyes back on Pamela. "Can we talk for a minute?"

"Uh… sure." The witch replied quietly, clearly just as nervous as he was. Arc has seemed to sense the tension, because the moment Keith sat down, the gargoyle wrapped his claws around the sides of his plate and flew over to the counter to finish his meal. The two of them sat at the booth, silently surveying the situation, "You cut your hair." Pamela suddenly blurted out, trying to refrain from cringing at the idiotic comment, _"Dumbass…"_ She growled in her mind.

"Where the hell have you been all these months? Do you realize just how much everyone's been worried about you?" Keith suddenly exclaimed, obviously having wanted to question her for a long time now about what had happened to her.

"Yeah, I really felt the worry when I broke in to my own apartment to find that I had been evicted." She replied sarcastically, surprised when he gave her quite an angered response.

"So, what?" Keith said, showing no sympathy, "Were you just expecting to come back and find out that life hadn't moved on without you? Especially with those letters you sent to me, Mac, and Jordann. I mean, what a shitty way to do it. 'I'm sorry, but I just couldn't stay here anymore. Best wishes!'?" He said, quoting from the letter he must have been sent. "Did you even think about anyone but yourself when you took off?"

Pamela shook her head, sighing angrily before letting out a small chuckle, "That really shows just how much you know me if you think that I'm capable of doing what you think I did. I've got two words for you. Bullet wound." She lifted her blouse up slightly, revealing a rather large circular scar to the side of her abdomen. "Those nice army guys stitched it up after inflicting it. You remember, right? I left you note, which _was_ from me, saying that I had gone to San Francisco to help my aunts. Well, this is what I got for my troubles. Oh! And also a little hole in the back of my back that goes right down to my spine after they stuck some device in me to turn me into a human weapon. I'm pretty sure I've still got the bruises from where they smacked me around when I got up a fight. Wanna see?"

Keith seemed to be stunned into silence from the information that Pamela had just given him. How could he have been so stupid? He knew she wouldn't lie about things like this. Hell, she had the injuries to prove it. He should have followed his instincts the moment he got that letter, "Pam, I-,"

"-have more insults? Lemme give you a few things to work with." Pamela lent forward, staring into his eyes with no intention of backing down. She was surprised at how much his disbelief in her had made her angry, but she just couldn't stop herself, "My entire life is in a small storage facility across town, I have no place to live, and the only person who hasn't completely turned on me is a gargoyle. So, go ahead. Let'm rip!"

Despite the situation, Keith had to smile. It was this fiery attitude that he had missed for the last few months. Carmine didn't have that kind of edge, but she also didn't have a vicious stubborn streak. "… Actually, I was gonna offer you a place to stay."

Pamela blinked and immediately unclenched her jaw. "What?"

"James moved out." Keith announced, shaking his head at the memory, "His trust fund kicked in and he decided to go party in Europe. He told me he wasn't coming back and his room's just sitting there, not being used. Besides, it sounds like you need to catch a serious break, so…"

"What's the rent to live in that palace of yours?" She asked cynically, having seen Keith's apartment many times and knowing that it probably wasn't cheap to stay in.

"Nothing. It's one of the perks of having a rich father. He brought it straight out when I came to the city for college, so there's no landlord to worry about. We just have to worry about the bills." He leant back on the bench on his side of the booth, "Yup, the guy may treat me like a non-entity, but non-entities get treated well these days." He said with a twinkle in his eye, making Pamela smile a little.

"Consider that break of yours caught."

* * *

Paige stood in front of the fireplace, staring into the bright orange flames that were being contained within their stone prison. She picked up the fire poker, prodding the logs and causing a spray of embers to erupt as fire grew a little stronger, before plopping down on the floor and heaving a sigh. She got no warmth from this fire. After what had happened today, she just felt numb. The witchlighter was so caught up in her own emotions, that she didn't notice when Aidan sat down behind her on the large cushion, wearing a fresh pair of black sweatpants and a rather generic looking white t-shirt. 

"Do you feel any better after your shower?" She asked quietly, not wanting to break the gentle atmosphere that they were in, with only the crackling fire making any loud noises.

He shrugged in response, "A bit better. I think it was good that I ate something, it's given me some strength to fight off this bug." He crossed his legs, taking on a similar position to his wife, "And I'm not feeling achy anymore, which is a good thing."

"Good…" Paige replied tiredly, moving closer to him, "Because I need a hug after today…"

Aidan chuckled a little, slinging an arm around her shoulders and pulling her closer to his body before kissing the top of her head. "I still believe you told that guy off. I mean, I know that you've wanted to do it ever since he took over, but I thought you had a little more self-control." He mused, sniffing loudly and making a rather unpleasant snorting noise.

Paige grimaced and pulled herself away from him a little so that they were just sitting one another, "Boy, there's nothing like snot to put a girl off…" She said with a repulsed smile, shaking her head when Aidan merely shrugged at the comment, "And I dunno why I told him off… He was being a jerk, and I didn't want to let him get away with it again. And, you know, it was the only way I could vent without snapping his neck, which is something I'm trying to refrain from doing after these past few months."

"Is that maybe why you lost your temper?" The elemental suggested, deciding to look at the fire instead of her as he began to speak, "… You killed a lot of people. It may have been in self defense, but it's still taking a human life. Are you trying to convince yourself that you're a good person by going into overdrive with these good deeds?"

"What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about the good will kick you've been on! We have nothing to eat in this house because you gave it all to the homeless shelter's food drive, you volunteered to paint Mrs. McGruther's house all by yourself, you've vanquished around ten demons this week, and when we went out for dinner last week, you blew twenty bucks by giving every homeless person you saw five dollars!" He exclaimed, his croaky voice breaking slightly.

Paige gasped in surprise, "Oh come on! I was just being charitable."

"There's being charitable, and then there's overcompensating." Aidan wrapped the blanket around his shoulders tighter, continuing to stare into the fire, "Look, Pam and I nearly killed one another, but you don't see me offering to pay for the rest of her college tuition, and you don't see her using her powers to banish this flu, which I wish you would do, by the way…" He said sadly, rolling his eyes as he felt a sneeze coming on. Sure enough, he sneezed loudly, making Paige jerk back in surprise. "Damnit…"

"You know magic can't cure the common cold, and the flu is basically a glorified cold. Call it one of the mysteries of the universe. You're just going to have to get over it like the rest of us…" She said, rubbing his back a little with a smirk before realizing something, "Oh, and speaking of Pam, why did you go after her when you were possessed? I mean, I'm guessing you didn't take in those powers just to kill. Why did you do it?"

Aidan laughed nervously for a moment, licking his lips as he thought of what to say. "You." He said simply, going on to explain fully. "When I had all that godly power running through me, it connected with my emotions, which obviously meant it connected to you." He stared into the fire as he recalled the experience, smiling a little. "I could sense every ounce of emotion, of life, running through you. What you felt, I felt ten times over. And since Pam was the thing you were feeling the most emotional about, my godly instinct was to end that agonizing pain."

"… So basically, it was some sort of primal reaction to what I was feeling?"

"Exactly." Aidan said with a firm nod of his head, "There's a reason gods are called gods. They live on a higher plane, and gently guide the world because they are above us, but that also means that they have no concept of human feelings whatsoever… So, when Poseidon took over my body and felt your emotions ten fold, he reacted the way anyone does when they feel pain."

The witchlighter narrowed her eyes a little, "But if you know all this, why did you even think of trying to take in the power in the first place?"

"My family was falling apart and no one around us had the power to put an end to it. I thought if I got the power, I would be fix anything. I guess I kinda screwed up, huh?" He said meekly, smiling wryly as he looked down at the floor, shedding the blanket from his shoulders as he felt a little warmer.

Paige smiled warmly and leaned in to kiss him on the cheek, lacing her fingers with his and taking his hand, "You're so great. You know that, right?"

"Well, I try." Aidan replied with a grin, making them both laugh quietly as they turned back to the fire. Paige moved back into her previous position with her husband's arm around her shoulders, listening to his heartbeat, "So, what are you going to do about your job? See if you can maybe get it back through a lawsuit or something?"

"Nah." Paige said in a lax tone, "I don't have the energy for it, to be honest with you, and my heart just isn't in it anymore…" She looked up to Aidan's face, "You don't mind if I just take some time to think about this, do you? I mean, I know we're not the richest people in the world, but-,"

Aidan cut her off abruptly, tightening his hold around her, "Take all the time you need."

* * *

Piper let go of Leo's hand as she let down the aura of invisibility that she had cast over her and her husband. To anyone watching, it would have looked like they had suddenly appeared out of the wall of the hospital room. "Oh my God…" The eldest Charmed One breathed, walking slowly towards the hospital bed to see the damage she had wrought on a human life. "Okay, what do we do?" 

"You…" Leo began, gently pushing Piper out of his way so he could stand over the crippled man in the bed, the only sound in the room being the monotonous beep of a heart monitor. "… don't need to do anything. Once I do this, you need to stay away from him completely. Even the slightest touch could end up triggering his memories, even after some memory dust."

"Trust me; I never want to see this man again…" Piper retorted with a shiver.

With a nervous sigh, Leo held his hand above Cid Bugle's head, and began to rub his index finger and thumb together. After a few seconds, tiny twinkles of golden light rained from his fingers like snow, slowly descending onto the unconscious man's face and vanishing underneath his skin with a gentle white glow, wiping his memory of the past months. "Okay, I gave him a pretty powerful dose. He won't remember the last years of his life."

"Alright…" Piper replied hoarsely, shaking her head as fresh tears began to form, "… You shouldn't have to clean up this mess. I'm so sorry…"

Leo's look was unreadable as he gazed across to his shattered wife, "I'm doing what's best for my family…" He said simply, walking towards her and pulling into a tight embrace before being swept up in a swathe of orbs that momentarily lit the room up in a blue glow, ascending them through the ceiling and disappearing from the scene.

* * *

"Okay! This is the last box!" Pamela announced as she walked into Keith's apartment, putting down the large cardboard box next into the pile of similar boxes that were now crowding the entrance. "Well, it's the last box _I'm_ bringing up. Arc's getting the other three." She said brightly, moving her hair away from her face as she put her hands on her hips. 

Keith's eyes widened as he took a sip of water from a chilled bottle in the fridge, "Three?"

"Oh! They're like feathers to him." Pamela replied, laughing a little at her ex's shocked expression, "Add in his amazing balance and I wouldn't be surprised if he's got them all on one finger right about now."

"I hope you're making him come up the fire escape with them. The last thing we need is one of the neighbours seeing a gargoyle in the elevator." Keith said with a chuckle, putting his water back into the fridge and walking out of the open plan kitchen to look at the labels on the boxes, frowning at one that was marked 'WTF?' He was going to question Pamela on it, but then he remember that it had been Jordann and McKenzie that had packed up her stuff, so they had probably thrown in everything that looked weird into this box.

"Alright, I think I have a bottle of wine in one of these things." Pamela said, tapping the top of one of the boxes, "So, why don't we crack it open and celeb-?"

"Actually… I have a date." Keith said quietly, but just loud enough to make sure that Pamela could hear him over her own voice. "Yeah, see, I started dating Carmine Fitzgerald a few weeks ago. I was supposed to be cooking dinner for her here, but I changed it and I'm gonna go cook at her place."

"Oh… okay." The witch replied meekly, while silently seething. Carmine Fitzgerald! Pamela had sat next to her in her Media Ethics lectures, and they had gotten to the point where she could have considered the girl a friend. But due to this recent development of moving in on a friend's ex, Pamela was prepared to hit Carmine the next time she saw her, "We can just do some fancy breakfast tomorrow morning then. You know I kick ass with a waffle iron."

Keith seemed to dread saying what he was about to say, cringing a little. There was no way to spare her feelings with this, "Actually, I probably won't be coming home until around noon…" A deep silence passed between the two as Pamela processed what this meant, "But hey! You can just leave all your boxes out here for now and I'll help you unpack tomorrow. There's no point in you having to do this alone."

"No! Its okay, I don't want to clog up your living room for too long, so I'll probably just get started right now." She picked up a box, smiling at him, "Really, I'm fine, go and enjoy your… sleepover."

"Okay…" Keith replied, biting his bottom lip a little as he picked up his jacket from the back of the couch, "I'll see you tomorrow. We'll talk about all this then, alright?" He said, grabbing his keys off the counter before he headed towards the door, shutting it behind him.

Pamela began to walk down the hallway to where her room was, when there was a knock at the door. She rolled her eyes and groaned, hoping it wasn't a pushy neighbour welcoming her to the building in the most annoying way possible. She put the box upon the kitchen counter and went to open the door, surprised at who she found on the other side.

"We baked you a cake to say we're sorry!" McKenzie grinned inanely, shoving something covered in silver foil in Pamela's direction while Jordann smiled nervously at her side; afraid of how the Halliwell would react after the way she had acted earlier that day.

Pamela laughed a little, pursing her lips and raising an eyebrow, "You sure you don't wanna rethink that statement?"

"Yes!" She retorted with just as much enthusiasm, not noticing that Jordann was shaking her head next to her, "… Okay, we _bought_ you a cake to say we're sorry! Happy now? You've ruined the magic!" McKenzie continued to grin, before the feral next to her nudged her a little.

"Mac, give her the damn cake before you dig us even deeper graves…" Jordann hissed wearily, giving Pamela an apprehensive stare as McKenzie handed over the cake. "Seriously though, we really are sorry. What we did was totally-,"

"Just and rational." Pamela finished for her, moving out of their way as an invitation for them to come in. "Although I appreciate the baked goods, I really don't deserve it. I was a total bitch to you guys this morning just because you were trying to make the best a crappy situation." She picked at the foil on the cake, "So, yeah, I'm sorry. Can we eat cake now?"

The two of them laughed a little, "Sure. I mean, we've got to eat something while you tell us how you ended up moving in with your _ex_!" Jordann exclaimed, taking the cake from Pamela and setting it down on the counter, "I mean, last we heard, the guy was pretty pissed at you for taking off, and now you've reached a level you didn't even reach when you were dating! Spill the beans, lady!"

Pamela sighed and rolled her eyes, thinking of what to say "… I don't think there's going to be enough cake for this…"

* * *


	24. Not So Fun For All The Family

_Okay, as I've stated many times on my site, this chapter was meant to be a bit of fun. I'm pretty proud of it, especially the vanquish at the end, as I think it was pretty creative, if I do say so myself. Lol. There is a deleted scene that I decided not to include, as it didn't really effect the plot, and this chapter was already massive without it. But I'm really proud of the scene (It goes in between the last two scenes. I'm sure you'll be able to guess what it is once you've read the chapter) so I think I'll post it on my site soon, look out for it!_

_Enjoy!_

**Not So Fun For All The Family**

Emma bounced Lorna excitedly on her knee as the entire tent of people erupted in applause, whistling, and just general actions of amazement and adoration. The two redheads joined in on the fun, Emma lifting her daughter high above the people standing in front of her so she could see the Invincible Man play up to his fans. He had eaten steak knives, juggled hot coals, and had even deliberately fell from a trapeze just to prove that he could survive the fatal fall, completely unscathed. The man was an incredible act for the circus.

"Thank you! Thank you!" An abnormally tall man boomed from the center of the tent, slinging his arm around the Invincible Man. Emma couldn't see any microphone on him, but she guessed it was probably so small that she couldn't see it from where she was sitting. "I hope you enjoyed the show! That was the last viewing for this evening, but the other attractions will be open far into the night! Enjoy your visit to Cirque De Magie! Please leave the tent in an orderly fashion!"

As instructed, the crowd began to stand up from the bleachers and head for the exit. Emma watched as the Invincible Man, the pinnacle of the main show, walked out of the back of the tent where earlier she had seen various trailers for the performers to rest in. "Did you enjoy the show, Lorny?" She asked, gripping the child's hand tightly to avoid losing her in the crowd.

Lorna nodded enthusiastically, "Yeah! I like da fiya bweafers!" She grinned, thinking back to the two men that had walked into the ring and put on a spectacular display of endurance as they handled fire in ways that most people would never be able to.

"Yeah, they were good, weren't they?" Emma said distantly. She had her suspicions about that act, as the man hadn't been working with fiery torches like most fire performers. They had somehow made fire burst into life within the palm of their hands. It had probably been a trick of the eye though. Demons wouldn't be working at a circus, would they?

Hoisting Lorna up around her waist, Emma walked out of the tent into the part of the circus that held the rest of the attractions, and right into the heavy rain. It had been comfortably warm in the tent, but now that they were back outside, both mother and daughter shivered involuntarily at the sudden drop in temperature and pulled closer to one another for heat. Emma couldn't help but smile when Lorna wrapped her arms around her neck, sleepily leaning on her shoulder.

This was really the first time that the two had been able to spend some time together. With the hectic lifestyle living with a Charmed One brought, there wasn't really any time to spend with your children, let alone get a full night off from demon attacks, family squabbles, and just general interruptions that got in the way of life.

"S'cuse me!" Emma turned her head to see someone running towards her. As he neared, she saw it was one of the men that breathed fire during the show. To be honest, Emma thought that he was dressed like a genie, wearing baggy pantaloons and an open waistcoat, both as orange as the fire make up that surrounded his sparkling green eyes. It looked as if he was barely eighteen. "Are you Emma DeLauro?"

The empath blinked in surprise, swing Lorna to her other hip in a protective manner, "Uh… yeah. How did you know my name?"

The boy shook his head vigorously, apparently out of breath, "No time for that! Mr. Statall needs to see you immediately!" He spun on his heel and began to run back to the other side of the tent, stopping when he realized that Emma wasn't following. "C'mon! We need your help!" He hissed urgently, resuming his journey when Emma began to cautiously follow.

After a few minutes, they came across a silver trailer that was just outside the back entrance of the main tent. A crowd of circus workers had gathered around the narrow doorway, where light was pouring out from the interior. From the wave of adrenaline, fear, and curiosity that Emma was sensing from the crowd, she figured that something wasn't right.

As she approached, the group of circus folk immediately split apart to let her through to go after the fire breather, who had disappeared into the trailer. "Um… you may not want to take your child in there, sweetheart." Emma turned to see that a rather small old woman was talking to her. Emma assumed that this woman was the psychic of the circus, with the copious amounts of costume jewelry and hideous choice in clothes.

At this point, the tall man that had spoken to the audience in the tent came out of the trailer, having to duck down a lot just to get through the door, "That's perfectly alright, Celeste. I've enchanted the scene so the horror is invisible to the child's eyes." He said to the old woman, who stepped back and seemingly vanished into the anxious crowd. "Thank you for coming, I'm Robert Statall." He held out a massive hand, which Emma shook, "Please, follow me."

Stepping into the trailer, Emma held onto Lorna with an even stronger grip. For some reason, this man was unreadable, and when she did get close to accessing his mind, she was mentally thrown back by a swirling mass of enigmas. "How do you know my name? And what is this all about?"

"It's my job to know the visitors to my circus." Statall replied simply, "And this…" He raised his arm in the direction of the back of the trailer, "… is what this is all about. Like I said, I enchanted the scene; your child can't see anything."

"If you think that's true, then you obviously don't know my daughter." Emma spat, clamping her hand over Lorna's eyes the moment she noticed a splatter of blood on the floor. Sure enough, it was a rather gruesome scene. The poor man had had a fireball or something similar, plow right through his chest and shatter the window behind him. Smoke and blood were pouring from the large hole in his chest, going all over the small sofa in the trailer. Emma's jaw dropped when she saw it was the Invincible Man. _Oh, the irony _she thought.

"Whatever killed him smashed the window. That's what alerted us to his death. We're a very tightly knit group, so we all immediately felt it when he passed away…" Statall informed her, looking down mournfully at the dead man before lowering his hand to close his eyes, which had been frozen open in shock and terror. "Can you help us?"

"To do what? This is a matter for the police!"

Statall scoffed at the suggestion, "You and I both know the police wouldn't be able to solve this! You live with a Charmed One, do you not? We could really use their help as well." He moved towards her, his height making the redhead feel a little intimidated. "Please, help save my circus."

Emma sighed, biting her lip and slowly removing her hand from Lorna's eyes, "If I were Gil Grissom, I'd be making a pun right now before the credits rolled…"

* * *

Piper yawned as she swung the steering wheel to the right, guiding the car into a loosely marked parking space. The fact that it was extremely early in the morning didn't help her figure out if she had maneuvered her vehicle correctly, as it was still pitch black due to it being late January, not to mention she had been rushed the out of the door without her initial cup of coffee. "You better have a good reason for rushing me out of the house at five in the morning, Emma." She hissed warily, careful not to wake up the three sleeping children in the back seat, along with Leo, whose face was pressed up against the window as he slept soundly.

"It's the murder of an innocent man. Of course that's a good reason." Emma replied calmly, jittering slightly after the numerous cups of coffee she had had during a sleepless night of research.

"Yeah, well, all I know is that you're going to be the one to explain that Phoebe and Paige." Piper droned back tiredly, bringing the car to complete stop and turning off the engine before she got out, "Alright, time to wake up, people!" She snapped, clapping her hands sharply waking everyone in the back seat. "There's an empty circus for us to explore!"

As soon as the words came out of her mouth, Piper watched as both of her sisters' cars came down the large dirt path that ran through Golden Gate Park. It seemed that Brennan and Aidan were driving, with their wives slumped in the passenger seat, looking as if they had been drugged. The small drops of drool running from their mouths didn't help their cause.

As the Mini pulled up next to her, a devilish grin spread across Piper's face as she crept up to the window on the passenger's side. Bending down a little, she raised her fist to the glass and beat it furiously. Phoebe suddenly jerked awake, her head flying back and smacking off the headrest and making Piper burst into bouts of hysterical laughter. The middle Charmed One groaned and rubbed the back of her neck as she got out of the car, glaring at her elder sibling, "You just gave me whiplash!" She shouted, unwittingly waking up Paige, who was in the car next to hers.

"I'm sorry!" Piper replied, still chuckling a little, "I gotta get my kicks somehow since I was robbed of the one that my morning coffee usually gives me." She said with a side glare to Emma, who merely rolled her eyes in response. "Looks like Paige was just as lucky as we were."

The witchlighter in question shuffled her feet in the damp grass towards her sisters, relying on the combined efforts of the ever energetic Melinda and Emma to drag her forwards, "You know, before today, I wasn't even aware that there _was_ such a thing as five a.m." Paige groaned grouchily, modeling her signature pout as she looked towards Piper's car to see Leo ushering the children out of the backseat. "But then again, I've been getting up at ten most days since I don't have a job…"

"Rub it in, why don't you?" Brennan grumbled with a yawn as he finished adjusting the baby carrier that was attached to his upper body with Faith residing inside, sleeping soundly against her father's chest while Connor stood sleepily at Brennan's side, swaying a little. "My one day off in ages and I get to spend it solving a mystery…"

"Actually, you didn't need to come. Statall only wanted me to bring the girls, but I figured you guys would enjoy a day at the circus…" Emma replied meekly, looking at the tired and angry faces that surrounded her, "Boy, was I wrong!"

"I don't see what you guys are so moody about." Aidan said, looking the most out of all of them. "I mean, it's not everyday you get to be up early enough to see the fog in Golden Gate Park before the sun burns it away." He stuffed his hands into his jacket pockets and leaned against the hood of Phoebe's car, looking around the group with wide awake eyes.

"How are you so… alert?" Leo asked with genuine confusion, barely able to keep his eyes open.

"Because he, unlike the rest of us normal people…" Paige began, shooting a jealous glare in her husband's direction. "… Doesn't need caffeine in the morning. All he needs is a ten minute shower to wake himself up."

"So, wait, if we're not needed here, can I take the kids home and just go back to bed? I think it's the best for us right now." Leo asked with a pleading tone, looking down at the children who, at the sight of the circus, had seemingly perked up and where as wide awake as their cousins. "Never mind…" He sighed.

"The Charmed Ones!" The three witches concerned turn to see Mr. Statall walking towards them. All of them were immediately shocked into silence by the height of the man. At first thought he was on stilts, but when they saw just how easily he was walking, their suspicions were replaced with shock once again. "Such an honour to meet three witches such as yourselves!" He bent down, shaking each of their hands vigorously, "But alas, I wish it were under better circumstances."

"… Emma, how much did you tell this guy?" Piper asked with a wide eyed stare to the redhead, before turning back and craning her head upwards to look up at Statall's face. "How did you know that we were…?"

"Witches? Oh, my dear, _everyone_ in the magical community knows who you are! Why, some of your biggest fans work here!" He boomed enthusiastically. "It's a shame your eldest niece couldn't join you, she has a large fan base with the animal tamers…" He looked down sadly for a second, before retaining his bright attitude. "Follow me. I think you'll find we have something for all of you within these grounds."

Complying, the group sauntered after the tall man, heading towards the main striped tent where it looked like a trailer park. Light was pouring from the windows of each of the mobile homes as people began to light up fires outside to gain warmth, gathering around a large fire in the centre and talking amongst themselves and turning their heads as the Charmed Ones walked towards the Invincible Man's trailer. It looked like everyone here didn't have the same problem with getting up early as all the Halliwells did.

"Now, I assume you three will want to use your various powers on the trailer to find clues?" Mr. Statall suggested, earning an apprehensive nod from Piper. "Alright then. For the rest of you, feel free to have a look around. Like I said, there's a little something for everyone here." He beamed down at them all. "If you're worried about the little ones, don't be. They will come to no harm here."

"You bring us here to investigate a _murder_ and then tell us our children are perfectly safe here?" Paige asked with a raised eyebrow, sounding skeptical.

"I can assure you, Ms Matthews…" Statall began sternly, but kindly, "… that I have taken extra precautions since last night's tragedy. With the measures I've put into place, I'll be able to know the instant someone so much as sneezes within these grounds. The circus, at its core, is ultimately a place for children to enjoy themselves, therefore their safety takes president. Your children being here is like them walking around in a massive crystal cage."

"Wow. To do all that, you must be an extremely powerful…" Phoebe trailed off, frowning a little, "What are you anyway?"

"A mystery." He replied with a mischievous twinkle in his eye. "Now, I'm afraid I must be off. We do, after all, open in just a few hours and there is much to do before we open to our audience, which is the lovely people of San Francisco." Statall shook all three of their hands once again. "It was a spectacular experience to meet you all. I hope to see you around the circus at some point today." He said, looking at the three men behind the Charmed Ones as he spoke with a knowing stare, before he suddenly vanished in a burst of colourful sparks that glittered in the air before falling to the ground.

Brennan frowned a little, thinking about what had just happened, "Did… he just hit on all three of us at the same time?"

* * *

Leo walked into a large barn-like structure with Wyatt and Chris at his sides. He assumed that the circus set this up wherever they went, to make sure the animals weren't trapped in uncomfortable cages. It was impressive, as the place was massive, with many different floors for the different types of animals, and a canopy of magically conjured tree branches grew across the large skylight at the top for all the birds. Leo could only assume that it was with a little magical assistance that they were able to erect such an amazing structure in such a short time.

"Dad!" Chris suddenly shouted, tugging on his father's jacket sleeve feverishly and pointing to his left, "Dad! That bird! It's on fire!" He shouted, watching with horror at a bird that, sure enough, was sitting on a metal perch, completely consumed in an intense fire while one of the animal handlers looked on with a hard stare.

Leo smiled a little, ruffling his son's messy brown hair, "Chris, its okay. That bird is a phoenix, that's what there supposed to look like. It's not in any pain or anything." Seeing his Chris needed further reassurance, Leo walked over to the flaming bird and tapped its tamer on the shoulder, "Sorry, but my son's never seen a phoenix before and he's finding it hard to believe that it's perfectly fine, so-,"

"You want me to tell her to take on her normal form?" The trainer finished with a warm smile, "No problem. You'd be surprised how many kids haven't seen a phoenix these days. It just goes to show just how much damage demonic hunters are doing to magical wildlife." The man turned to the phoenix, nodding his head, "Okay, Avery, you can stop now."

At the man's command, the flames immediately dropped around the creature, revealing a beautiful bird underneath with spectacular golden feathers that shone magnificently in the pale light coming from the outside. "It's okay, sweetheart." The phoenix said suddenly, making the three Wyatts jump in surprise, "I'm perfectly alright. I was just giving myself a heat in this cold weather."

"It… talked!" Wyatt exclaimed, curiosity getting the better of him and making him walk forward to the perch that the phoenix was sitting on. "Dad, is this really a phoenix? 'Cause I read a book and it didn't say that they talk." The nine year old asked, cocking his head at Avery as she tucked her head under her wing and begin preening herself. She seemed to be grooming just like a normal bird.

"Oh, she's definitely a phoenix." The tamer replied, folding his arms, "Mr. Statall charmed all the animals so that they could communicate with other magical beings. Of course, we have a few feraltongues working here, but for the rest of us, the charm really helps us practice for routines." He suddenly outstretched his hand in Leo's direction, "I'm Theodore, by the way. And this is my trusty sidekick, Avery."

"I'm Leo," The elder replied, shaking the tamer's hand with a friendly smile, "So; do all these animals take part in the show? Because if they do, then it must be one long show!" Leo remarked, looking upwards to the higher floors and hearing a host of different animal noises coming from them.

"Oh, no. Mr. Statall saved a lot of them from demons, and others from just poor caretaking. Not many of them take part in the show, but we keep them happy and healthy. After all, if we can't respect those who share this planet with us, what kind of hope does mankind have?" Theodore asked, before frowning a little, "Wait… you said your name was Leo?"

"Uh… Yeah."

The trainer's eyes lit up with excitement, "Mr. Statall told us you would be coming! He said that you would be able to help us out with Balthazar. He's been pretty moody ever since Alan died. Follow me." He turned towards a set of steps that seemed to lead up to the upper levels of the building, "Oh, the children are free to come along too."

At the thought of seeing another magical animal, Wyatt and Chris rushed forward without even consulting Leo, forcing the Elder to run after his children up the stairs. Once they had caught up to Theodore, Leo walked up to his pace and moved along next to him so he could talk to the animal tamer, "So, can I ask who Alan is?"

"Oh, he's better known as the Invincible Man…" Theodore explained with a hint of sorrow, "Yeah, he was really the only one that could talk to Balthazar without having to run away in fear for his life, so the poor guy's obviously taken his death pretty badly." He turned to Leo with a smile, "But Mr. Statall says you'll be able to get through to him and have him ready for tonight's show, so I won't doubt you in the slightest."

Leo nodded, still trying to take this information. He didn't even know what he was supposed to be doing, yet somehow, he was perfect for the job? This place just kept getting weirder and weirder, "So what animal does Balthazar work with?"

At this question, Theodore chuckled a bit and stopped at one of the larger animal pens, raising his arm to present something behind the steel bars, "He doesn't work with the animals. He _is_ one of the animals."

Turning his head, Leo looked into the pen and gazed upon the creature within. His eyes widened with shock and fear at what he saw, and immediately he gently pushed Wyatt and Chris back from the bars. It was a lion, possibly the biggest one that Leo had ever seen in real life or on television. It was lying down at the back of the cage, casually licking one of its massive paws in a sophisticated manner to try and groom itself. If there was ever a lion that lived up the title of being the king of animals, Balthazar was it.

Ruffling his thick, coppery mane, the lion turned to see the four people looking in at him from the other side of the bars. His beady eyes focused on Leo and he got up to his feet, prowling across the expanse of the pen and going right up to the edge of the bars, managing to poke his nose through one of the spaces. Wyatt and Chris hid behind their father as Balthazar began to open his mouth, exposing two rows of large, sharp teeth and saying…

"What the bloody hell are you lot staring at?"

* * *

Aidan sniffed a little as he stood at the edge of the diving board. He was still getting over his flu, and the last thing he should have been doing was plummeting twenty five feet into a pool of cold water. The elemental couldn't even remember how he had got roped into doing this. He had wandered into a tent just out of curiosity, and ended up talking to a few of the workers who had asked him to show how good a swimmer he was. Next thing he knew, he was standing on the highest diving board above a massive tank of water. From where Aidan was, all he had to do was stretch up a little to touch the top of the tent. His children, who were sitting in the bleachers watching him, looked like ants from up here!

Deciding to finally take the plunge, Aidan jumped off the diving board, flipping three times in the air before going into the water smoothly, cutting through it with his normal skill when it came to swimming, before showing off his phenomenal speed in the water by doing lap after lap around the large pool. The water was surprisingly warm, and Aidan had to wonder whether or not that was just another part of this circus that was magical, as everything else seemed to be so far.

When he surfaced, the excited shouts of the twins were the first things to his ear. Aidan leant his arms on the side of the massive tank, grinning at the two little girls who were currently jumping around excitedly on the benches. Even a few of the visitors to the circus had came in to watch, and were clapping his prowess when it came to swimming, causing the elemental's cheeks to go red.

"Woo! Daddy's da bestest swimma!" Emma screeched, stomping up and down on the benches and nearly yanking Melinda's arm out of its socket as she held her hand during her little burst of energy. "I wants to try dat!" She shouted, having inherited her father's love for the water, "I wanna jump from _reeeeeeeeeally_ high!"

"No you don't!" Melinda said with a pout, feeling a little left out as she didn't the share the same passion for swimming that her sister and father had, "You's a scaredy cat!"

"Am not!" Emma retorted, sticking out her tongue at Melinda and smiling proudly as she folded her arms in the most dramatic way possible. "I'll prove it!" She said indignantly, beginning to vanish in a surge of water that sprouted from underneath her feet before Aidan jumped in to stop the argument from the pool.

"Ah, ah, ah! Emma, don't you dare splash up to that diving board!" He said, giving his more adventurous daughter a stern look underneath his soaking wet hair, "If you do, I'll have no choice but to get Mommy to take away your powers!" At this threat, the water that was rising around Emma's feet immediately dissipated with another pout, "Thank you."

Jerome and Natalie, the two people that Aidan had been talking to before his dive, laughed a little at the children, before clapping at the skill that the elemental had shown in the water. Natalie gently beckoned the twins off the bleachers as the four of them made their way down to the edge of the tank. "Wow, Aidan, that was amazing!" Jerome exclaimed, "Ever think of running off to join the circus?"

"Yes, but my wife would probably kill me." Aidan joked in response, earning a smile from the two performers. "I thought I was pushing it with that last flip though. I was really close to hitting the water on my stomach."

Natalie shook her head with a knowing smile, "If you're the water elemental, you'll do no wrong when it comes to your element. Which also means you'll never have to know the pain of a belly flop. Trust me, when I gave up my elemental powers, I had to practice so hard to get back up to the standard of swimming skill I had had before."

Aidan blinked in shock, "Wait, does that mean that you're my…?"

"Predecessor?" She questioned, before nodding, "Yeah, I was the water elemental for a few years before I gave it up. I just couldn't be bothered with those monthly rituals anymore..." She looked a little ill at the thought of her elemental days, before resuming a bright expression and looking up to Aidan, "Listen, Jerome and I were talking while you were doing your victory lap, and since our show needs to last an extra fifteen minutes tonight because of Alan's death, we'd really like it if you could join us and the rest of the group."

The elemental's eyes widened at the thought, and he immediately started to shake his head, "No… no way! I'm no performer! I wouldn't even know what I was doing; I'd get stage fright or something."

Jerome shook his head in a similar fashion, "It's not the bad, trust me. We could teach you the routine in a couple of hours. All it involves is some fancy swimming moves, some interaction with the animals, and you're done! You've shown us you're a natural in the water, and I'm sure you'll still be even if you have a-,"

"So what do you say? I know for a fact that you'd enjoy it, I can tell." Natalie suddenly jumped in, cutting Jerome off. The moment she saw the look of indifference on Aidan's face, she looked down to the children, beaming, "Kids, would you like to see your Dad in the big show tonight?"

Melinda and Emma's faces instantly lit up at the prospect of their father being part of a circus show, and immediately resumed the hyperactive jumping that they had been doing upon the bleachers. "Yeah! Yeah! Peeeeeeeeas, Daddy!" They shouted in unison. It was too perfect not to be rehearsed, but Aidan found it endearing anyway.

"What the hell… I'll give it a shot."

Both Jerome and Natalie shot unnerving false smiles at him, before they went quiet, "There's just little detail that we forgot to mention…" Natalie said, leaning up and dipping her hand into the tank and pulling up the leg of her jeans to expose her calf. She rubbed her wet hand on her bare skin, and as she took her palm away, shimmering golden scales covered the patch of skin that had been moistened with water.

"You're a mermaid?" Aidan asked, looking as the scales disappeared since the area of skin was beginning to dry off.

"The whole group is… Well, obviously Jerome and the other guys are mermen. Thanks to the miracle of lighting, no one really notices the transformation when we hit the water; they just think it's a trick of the eye." She explained, biting her lip a little in anticipation of what she had to tell them, "… So, to make the show work… You're going to have to get a fishtail."

"_What?_"

"We have a potion that lasts for twenty four hours!" Jerome suddenly jumped in, pulling out an aqua coloured potion from his back pocket and grinning sheepishly, "It'll turn your legs into a tail whenever they come into contact with water." He gave Aidan a pleading look, cocking his head a little, "… You _did_ say you'd help out."

"Yeah, that was when I just thought I was swimming, not getting covered in scales!" Aidan exclaimed, his panic making his voice going higher than normal. He looked down into the water sadly, frowning, "… I like my legs."

"Like Jerome said, it's only for twenty four hours and only when you come into contact with water." Natalie repeated, before adding to her statement with a little smile, "You haven't experienced the full joys of swimming until you've swam with a tail." She said, trying to put a tempting twist on the situation by raising her eyebrow and smirking.

Aidan looked at the two pleading performers, thinking over what to do. He had been prepared to do the show, but the fact that he had to now do it without his legs was something he had never expected. On the other hand, he had always been intrigued by the speed in which merpeople were able to travel. He debated over these points, before thrusting out his hand. "Gimme the potion." He demanded quietly, taking the vial from Jerome's hand and downing it as fast as possible.

Aidan felt an odd bubbling sensation in the pit of his stomach as the potion began to take effect. Pale green light glowed in the water as the transformation started, and before he knew it, the two legs which he had been gently treading water with became a single entity that gently flipped back and forth. From what he could see, turquoise scales had consumed the lower half of his body, stopping just above his navel and casting a blue-green glow over the water as light reflected off each scale. A gigantic fin of the same colour was now in place of his feet, swaying calmly as Aidan silently panicked. He looked down at his newly acquired tail, shaking his head.

"This just keeps getting weirder and weirder…"

* * *

Piper stumbled into another loosely built structure in search of her sisters, trying to find them so that she could tell them what she had found in the trailer shortly after they had gone to investigate the other workers. Underneath the tiny dining table in the trailer, she had found a simple stud earring. It didn't really narrow down the field, since anyone, man or woman, performer or backstage worker, could be wearing an earring like this, but it was a start. Scrying had turned out to be useless, as the crystal was pulled all over Golden Gate Park on the map, thanks to the high concentration of energy of the circus. And now, she was going around in circles. Literally.

"Phoebe? Paige?" Are either of you in here?" Piper called out in a bored tone as she walked down a dark corridor which slowly widened as she went in deeper. The eldest Charmed One reached the end of the corridor, and instantly rolled her eyes at what she found. It was a rather small circular room, with mirrors covering every inch of the walls. It was a hall of mirrors. "Oh, for God's sake…"

"Tell me about it! You should be spending a day like this with your family, not hunting down a magical killer." Piper spun around, noticing that her reflection didn't move with her in one of the mirrors. It was talking to her instead. "We both know you don't want to be here…" The reflection said with a raised eyebrow.

"Oh, please!" Piper turned to see that another one of the mirrors had brought her reflection to life, "What better way to spend a day off than with kicking some demon ass?" To prove her point, the reflection kicked air with a cocky smile, stunning the real Piper into silence.

"You are so violent." Another one of the reflections spoke up, "I don't see why we just can't come to some agreement over this. I'm sure the killer will give himself up if he knows we're not going to hurt him…"

"Speak for yourself!" The opposite reflection boomed with a stern expression. "An eye for an eye, I say! When we find whoever killed the poor guy, let's make sure he knows exactly how it feels to die…"

From that point on, every reflection seemingly came of life within the mirrors. Each one voiced a different part of Piper's personality. Compassionate and heartless, peaceful and fiery, vengeful and diplomatic, and even her good and evil sides seemed to have something to say to one another. She was in a maelstrom of incoherent babble as the many sides of her soul bickered with one another. It was unbearable.

"You're extremely stressed. Perhaps you should meditate."

"No way! Knock someone's lights out! That'll relieve the tension."

"Maybe you should go and find Leo and release that stress. You know… nudge, nudge, wink, wink."

"Sex is not the answer! Leo will provide sage and elderly wisdom while you bask in his love."

"Screw that! What she needs is to get her proverbial rocks off!"

"Why can't I have a normal life?"

"Shut up! All of you!" The real Piper suddenly screamed, silencing every reflection as she spun around on the spot, glaring at each of them. She shook her head vigorously, her forehead creasing as she shot a thunderous look to each and every mirror. "Gotta get outta here…" She breathed, heading towards the exit unsteadily, "Too many yins and yangs…" With those final words, she ran back into the corridor in which she had come from, muttering spitefully under her breath.

"I _hate_ this circus!"

* * *

Brennan swung his wrists around in the air elaborately as the strands of lightning rising his from fingertips twisted and curled, making beautiful shapes with the neon blue element. He used to do this when Connor was a baby and couldn't sleep. He'd make shapes with the lightning. Smiling faces, galloping horses and even a clichéd cloud with lightning shooting from it. With years of practice, Brennan made his power into an art, and not just a way to defend himself.

Right now, however, he had to it on a far grander scale when just over the crib of a baby. At this moment, a massive rabbit, outlined by the sparking lightning flying from Brennan's hands, was twitching its ears. The mutant spun his wrists again, and the rabbit vanished in a spray of electricity as the lightning started to form another shape. This time, it took the form of a large dragon, which had its head turned up to the ceiling of the tent, and looked like it was roaring.

Brennan snapped his hands shut and the dragon vanished with a small sizzling noise. The performers that had been sitting on the bleachers with Connor and Faith seemed to be impressed as they stood up and ran down to go and talk to him. "Okay, now I can see why Nate asked you to join us in tonight's show." One of the performers, Bradley, said. "You're perfect for our elements show! You're gonna fit in really well with the rest of our electrokinetics."

"Uh… thanks, I guess." Brennan mumbled in return. He had agreed to help out in tonight's show as it would help him get closer to the firebreathers; people who could create fire out of the palm of their hand. They seemed to be prime suspects for the Invincible Man's murder, but Brennan had a feeling that these people weren't responsible. "So, just to be clear, I'm not going to have to wear a costume like that, am I?"

Bradley looked down at his bright orange firebreather outfit. Unbeknownst to Brennan, this was the same performer that had fetched Emma the previous night after the show to bring her to the Invincible Man's trailer. He looked down at his tangerine baggy pants and open waistcoat and smiled a little, "Oh, no, don't worry. This costume is only for the firebreathers… the people that work with lightning have purple costumes."

Brennan's eyes widened as his face paled, "Wha… What?"

Before he could question Bradley on this development, a screeching bout of caterwauling suddenly echoed through the tent as Faith began to scream her lungs out in her baby seat on the front bleacher. Connor followed the instructions that his mother had given a few weeks ago when Faith had done the same thing. He placed his small hand on the edge of the baby seat and gently began to rock it, "S'okay, Faify, I'm here…" The young boy said softly, the loss of his two front baby teeth making the end of his sister's name a little hard to pronounce. "Dad!" Connor suddenly shouted, "Faif is still cryin'!"

Brennan was already on his way other, smiling down at his youngest child as he lifted her out of the baby seat, "Hey, hey, hey… What's got you so upset, my girl?" He asked, bouncing a little in his step and shooting apologetic glances to the performers who had gone back to practicing their firebreathing techniques. After a few minutes, and even after Brennan had checked for the usual symptoms of the cause of a baby crying, Faith was still screaming. It wasn't until Connor turned slightly pale and began to sway on the bleacher that Brennan finally realized what was happening. Faith was experiencing her first premonition, and by the looks of things, it wasn't a good one.

Connor, with the faint empathic power he had inherited from his mother, could usually sense intense emotion within people that were close to him. "Dad…" He whispered, continuing to sway on the bleacher as if he were about to pass out, "Mom's in trouble…" He said, coming to that conclusion from the panic and fear radiating from his little sister.

"We need to move quickly." Mr. Statall stated, seemingly appearing out of nowhere and startling Brennan, "If what your daughter saw is accurate, then your wife doesn't have a lot of time…"

* * *

Phoebe climbed up the ladder to the top of the tower where the trapeze artists jumped from. She reached the top, helped to her feet by a nimble looking woman by the name of Josie. "Are you sure that this is completely safe?" The middle Charmed One nervously asked the woman as she latched her hands onto the trapeze swing. "I mean, what if I fall or something?" She looked down the long drop and instantly felt a severe case of vertigo coming on.

Josie shook her head with a smile, "You won't fall, trust me. Manny…" She nodded across to the opposite tower where a male performer was hanging from the swing by his legs, curling his calves over the top, "… is one of our best, so he'll catch you. Besides, between your levitation powers and the net down below, even if you do fall you won't get hurt one bit."

"Okay…" Phoebe replied with a fake smile. She still wasn't properly convinced, but as Josie had pointed out, her chances of getting hurt were extremely slim.

With a tentative jump, Phoebe flew forward, holding on to the swing so tightly that her knuckles went white. Her hair was hitting her in face, but she couldn't even try to blow it away in fear of losing her breath. She didn't have time to worry about it now though, as, with a sudden burst of courage, she leapt from her swing and grabbed the one in front of her, flying forwards once again to meet Manny. She threw her legs back and forth to keep up the momentum before jumping from her trapeze to grab the performer, but something happened that she hadn't expected, and something that she had dreaded.

Manny was swinging from his legs with a crimson glimmer in his eyes, a smirk on his face and his arms folded across his chest. He had no intention of even trying to catch her!

Knowing that she only had mere seconds to react, Phoebe summoned whatever clarity she had left to activate her levitation power, panicking further when she continued to plummet downwards. She opened her eyes, which she closed in fear, just in time to watch as a bright blue glow consumed the net, before it vanished from the spot within a cloud of orbs that took it God knows where. Finally, she let out a scream. Realizing that there was nothing between her and ground now. This was the end.

Suddenly, she felt an arm roughly wrap around her waist, and a warm body next to hers that lifted her upwards slightly, before slowly falling to the ground at a safe rate. Phoebe opened her eyes and was shocked to see Brennan's chest. She looked down and saw a pulse after pulse of electric energy fly from his free hand as he slowed their descent, landing on the dusty ground with a quiet padding noise. "Are you alright?" Brennan asked, placing his hands on her shoulders tightly, not wanting to lose her.

Phoebe couldn't say a word. The experience had left her breathless. All she could do was finally exhale the breath she had been holding ever since her fall and wrap her arms around Brennan's torso as tightly as she could, burying her face in his chest. He was slightly taken aback, as this was the grandest gesture of affection she had shown for him in months, so he nervously put his arms around her shaking body and returned the hug.

There was a scream from up above as Manny fell from the trapeze from which he had cockily watched Phoebe fall. Mr. Statall, who had provided the transport for the Mulwrays, stepped away from Connor and Faith and raised his arm, forming a claw with his hand, "Subsisto momentum!" He boomed in a voice that radiated with power. The speed that Manny was falling from began to slow, and eventually, he was frozen in place just inches from the ground. "He will be questioned. I assure you." He said darkly, twisting his wrist and unfreezing Manny, letting him drop the final few centimeters and land on the ground with a light thud.

"How… how did you that I was in danger?" Phoebe finally managed to ask, still not letting go of her husband as craned her neck to look up at his face, which given their proximity and height difference, was pretty hard to do.

"The kids." Brennan replied with a proud smile at his two children, who were currently watching in awe as Mr. Statall roughly brought Manny to his feet. "Faith had a premonition, and Connor was able to figure out what had happened, thanks to the little bit of empathy he gets from you… Oh, and he helped us get here in time." He added, nodding in Mr. Statall's direction.

"Josie tells me that the net disappeared in orbs." Mr. Statall said as he approached the couple, Connor lunging at his mother's legs and wrapping his arms around them as far as they could go. "Can you confirm this? I know that you were falling and probably not really paying attention to things like that, but-,"

"No, that's exactly what I saw." Phoebe confirmed confidently, frowning in confusion before coming to a conclusion. She took on a grave tone, her face stony as she spoke. "We need to go and find Paige…"

* * *

Paige walked into the large dark blue tent, hoping to question some of the workers that hopefully resided within. Now that it was the afternoon, the circus was flooded with visitors, so it was getting a little hard to tell them apart between the circus workers. But she had learned from doing this all day that the tents were always a vital source of information, and since this one had a large tank of water in it, she assumed it would be crawling with performers.

Like every tent she had been in, this one had a few visitors sitting in bleachers, watching the performers practice for the big show of the night. The difference was that this tent had the twins sitting by themselves on the front bench. This sight immediately set Paige's racing. Where was Aidan and why had he left their children unattended?

"Mommy!" Emma shouted, catching Melinda's attention and causing both of them to run over to Paige. The witchlighter knelt down and wrapped her arms around both girls as they ran into her embrace, "Mommy, come see! It's _so_ cool! When I grow up, I wanna be a mermaid!"

"So do I, Mommy!" Melinda chirped in, "Dere _so_ purdy!"

"What?" Paige asked with a deep frown, laughing a little at her daughters' random outbursts, "Girls, where's your dad?"

With a giggle, Melinda raised her hand and pointed towards the large tank, "In dere…" She said with a devilish grin, trading a knowing look with her twin sister as they both looked at the tank, making their mother dread what was in there just by the looks on their faces.

"Hey, girls!" Aidan shouted as he surfaced at the edge of the tank, his large turquoise tail visible through the clear glass that made the pool, "What have I told you about talking to strange…" He trailed off when he realized that he hadn't recognized his wife from underwater, "Paige! What… what are you doing here? Shouldn't you be… solving that murder?" He grinned as innocently as he could, his fear growing as Paige walked towards the edge of the tank, her eyes as big as saucers.

Thankfully, the first thing that came out of her mouth was a booming laugh, "Isn't that going to make walking difficult?" She joked with a large grin on her face, looking down at the tail, "How the hell did you end up with a tail?" She exclaimed, before looking down at the children, "Kids, why don't you go back and sit down on the benches while Mommy talks to the fish boy?"

The two of them watched as the twins bolted back to the bleachers in their usual energetic manner before deciding to continue their conversation, Paige shooting him an expectant smile as she waited for an answer, "Okay, I know this probably looks really weird, but they asked for my help and I accepted. Besides, it's been pretty fun so far, and Piper told me that Brennan's been roped into a show tonight as well, so…"

Paige put up her hands, "That's enough; you don't need to justify it. But, seeing as how you're kinda incapacitated at the moment…" She cringed a little at his tail, "I'm gonna take the kids with me. Do you think any of them or up for an interview?" The witchlighter asked, pointing to the other merpeople that were practicing further into the tank, doing various somersaults in the air before splashing back into the water.

"I doubt they did it." Aidan said confidently, looking back at his temporary colleagues.

"Why?"

"Because if you remember correctly, it was pouring with rain last night." Aidan pointed his thumb behind his back at the merpeople, "They can't go anywhere near water without their tails making an appearance. What were they going to do, crawl to the guy's trailer then use _fire_ to kill him?" He said skeptically, "These aren't your guys."

Paige rolled her eyes in annoyance, "Well, apparently, Brennan says he's already cleared the firebreathers of any involvement, so that doesn't really leave many suspects, does it?" She let out a wear sigh, groaning, "And speaking of tails, is yours a permanent feature? Because, I gotta tell you, as much as I love you wet and half naked, I prefer your legs."

Aidan smirked a little bit, "It's a twenty four hour thing, and as long as it doesn't rain anytime soon, I should be able to make it back to the car after the show. Until then…" He pushed himself away from the side of the pool, raising his large tail up from the water and slamming it down, splashing Paige with a light mist of moisture, "I'm gonna go swim!" He said with a mixture of excitement and childish glee that his wife had never really seen in him before.

"Okay then, Little Merman." Paige said with a smirk of her own, "I'm gonna go see if I can track down my sisters." The last time she had seen either of her siblings was when Phoebe branched out from her to go and check out the tent where performers practiced the trapeze. The middle Charmed One had pretended it was for the investigation, but Paige knew that Phoebe turned into a child at the sight of any circus and was filled with curiosity. "C'mon, you guys! You're gonna go explore with Mommy."

"Yay!" The twins shouted in unison, running towards their mother and colliding with her legs when they couldn't stop themselves in time. The two of them each took one of Paige's hands as they headed out of the tent, only to be stopped by a man, presumably a circus worker from what he was wearing, which could only be described as a tuxedo made entirely out of silver glitter.

"Excuse me… Are you Paige?" He asked, a desperate look in his eyes.

"Uh… yeah, why?"

"I need your help…"

* * *

"You know…" Balthazar began, giving Leo a quizzical look, "… you're alright for a human." He said, his beady eyes scanning the outside of the pen with a patronizing stare, "At the end of the day, I may get treated well, but I'm still an animal, and these people just don't listen to what I have to say." The large lion ruffled his mane slightly, and shot what almost looked like a smile in Leo's direction, "But you told me what I needed to know after listening. Thanks, mate."

The Elder smiled a little despite himself. The two of them had had a rocky beginning to their conversation, but it turned out that, ironically, they were a lot like. Balthazar was just one voice in a crowd, much like Leo was when it came to the rest of the Elders, and sometimes, they needed someone to listen to what they had to say. No one had to agree with their views, but as long as they listened, it was acceptable. "No problem. And I assure you, Alan's killer will be caught with the Charmed Ones on the case." Leo squinted his eyes a little as he prepared to ask his next question, "… Just out of curiosity, how is it that you're…?"

"British?" Balthazar finished, chuckling a little, "Born and bred in England, mate. The zoo I was in before Mr. Statall took me in was just the bottom of the barrel. I got so hungry that I was contemplating leaping over the bars and eating the next person that gawked at me." He pawed the straw covered ground a little, digging his claws into the wood underneath, "Great man, that guy. Although it's a bit of an assumption to call him a man. Nobody really knows what he is!"

"Yeah, I kinda got that impression when I met him, it's like he can tell the future or something." Leo mused, before the two fell into the comfortable silence that usually followed after each block of conversation.

"So…" Balthazar looked up his massive paw, cocking his head, "What's it like being married to a Charmed One? I hear they're all a little… unhinged."

"Then that must make me the leader of the unhinged."

Leo turned around to see Piper standing outside of the pen, her hands wrapped around two of the bars as she grinned in to her husband, Wyatt and Chris at her sides after having explored the rest of the barn while their father tried to talk the lion into doing the show this evening. "You going to introduce me to Aslan here?" She said with a smirk, making a reference to The Chronicles Of Narnia.

"Funny." Balthazar replied with a bored tone, giving the witch a patronizing stare as she entered the pen with her children, "I usually get Simba or Mufasa." He added, before looking up at the ceiling with a confused expression on his face, "I'm guessing that all these names are those of talking lions in popular culture these days? It's been a while since I've seen a movie."

"Evidently." Piper said with a look of slight fear. She was still getting used to the idea of a talking lion, let alone the fact that her husband seemed to have built up a rapport with the creature, "Hey, have you seen Phoebe or Paige? It's just that I found something in the trailer and I think we could probably work with it." She asked, Leo, who was sitting down in the pen with his back to the wall, facing Balthazar.

"Nope, although I've seen Emma." Leo replied, thinking back on what the psionic had said to him before leaving. "She was heading off to see the psychic with Lorna… Balthazar?"

Balthazar was now up on all fours, claws slowly sliding out of his paws and digging into the floor below, his dark beady eyes now shining deep red. The lion crouched slightly, bearing his large teeth before pouncing at Leo. Having the creature go into the attack position, the Elder immediately called on his orbing power and lifted himself away from the scene in a column of blue lights, causing Balthazar to crash into the magically reinforced wooden wall with an angry yelp as he realized he had missed his target.

Leo reappeared next to his family members, clinging to Piper's hand and wrapping an arm around his sons before once again orbing out just milliseconds from danger, as this time, Balthazar lunged through the cloud of orbs, smacking his head off the bars as the Wyatt family jettisoned out of the path of danger, reappearing in a swaddle of orbs outside of the cage. Balthazar let out a roar that shook the whole barn and immediately put as much of his head through the bars as he could fit, snarling and snapping at the air, sending saliva everywhere as the red light in his eyes got stronger.

Suddenly, a faint white glow passed over the lion's eyes, and immediately he stopped his vicious assault. Balthazar blinked a few times, frowning at the fact that the whole family was now outside of the cage, and that he was at the bars, "What the hell happened?" He asked, looking around his surroundings and noticing the large indent his first assault on Leo had left in the wall. "Did I do that?" The lion asked in disbelieve, ruffling his mane and shaking his head at the same time, "Bloody hell…"

Piper mimicked the movement, running a hand through her long, thick hair and folding her arms as a dark expression crossed over her face, "I hate this circus…"

* * *

Emma peered curiously into the cloudy crystal ball which sat on the small circular table that was draped in a thick satin cloth. Lorna sat on her lap, looking around at the many odd things that resided in the psychic's small tent. Shrunken heads dangled from their hair on the top of the tent, enlarged Tarot cards hung from the sides, and the whole place smelled of –what Emma could only describe as– old people.

The psychic in question suddenly came out of a concealed part of the tent, seeming to be startled at Emma's presence in the tent. "Oh my!" She gasped, putting her hand to her chest and taking a deep breath, "Sorry, sweetheart, you scared me. I wasn't expecting anyone else today. I don't usually get that many visitors."

"Oh, that's okay." The redhead replied, smiling, "I love all this psychic stuff though, so… what's your specialty? Tea leaves? The crystal ball?" She suggested, looking once again into the misty glass sphere in front of her. "Or is it something else entirely? I'm up for anything." Part of her love for this part of the circus was that Emma had spent many trips to the circus with her parents in the psychic's tent, always amazed at how they could tell the future. Of course, these people were just tricksters, but to a five year old, it was spectacular.

"I do palms." Celeste replied, glancing at the crystal ball on the table as she sat down in the seat opposite her customer, "Although I do dabble in a few of the other soothsaying arts when the mood strikes." Lorna's glance caught her eye and she looked down at the toddlers, beaming, "Oh, and who's this little beauty then?"

"Oh, this is Lorna. Aren't you going to say 'hi' to the nice lady?" Emma coaxed her daughter, bouncing her on her lap, only for her daughter to sit there silently, staring at the psychic's face with a blank expression on her face. This development caused Emma to look up and wince at what she saw. "Oh, that looks like it hurt!" She exclaimed, looking at the bloody tear the woman had down her left ear lobe. "Did someone rip your earring out or something?"

Celeste merely smiled in return and pulled her hair over her ear, covering up her injury. "If you'll excuse me, I'll return in a few minutes. Just wait there, I'll be right back." She said hurriedly, standing up and heading back to the other part of the tent that was concealed from Emma and Lorna's eyes.

* * *

"Ah!" Paige scrunched up her eyes and yelped as she felt the board she was tied to shake as the knife went through it. When she opened her eyes, she saw that the knife had landed to the right of her head, just inches away from cutting off a piece of her hair, and possibly a piece of her ear. "Uh… Okay, I know you need to practice and everything, and I'm happy to help, but can't you do this with rubber knifes or something?" The witchlighter asked, cringing as the man picked up another knife, reading to throw at the board. The twins were thoroughly enjoying this from the sidelines, as it seemed to make their mother a little nervous.

"Rubber knifes wouldn't exactly go through the wooden board though, would they?" Edwin pointed out, smiling kindly at her. "Look, we can stop anytime you want to, and if you feel a little nervous just before a throw, you can always orb out. That's why I asked for your help and not your sisters." He looked down at the knife, seeming to be thinking, "Thanks for doing this by the way, practicing with the mannequin is safer, but I work better if it's an actual person."

Paige smiled nervously, not able to take her eyes off the knife in his hands, "You're welcome…"

Edwin raised his arm behind his head, preparing to throw the knife, when a flash of crimson suddenly flashed over his eyes and his wrist turned a little. Wheeling backwards with a smirk, he hurled the knife towards the board Paige was strapped to, the sharp object spinning in the air multiple times before piercing Paige's left shoulder, going right through the board behind her as she screamed in pain.

"Mommy!" The twins shouted as Paige somehow managed to orb herself off of the board and collapse next to them, shielding her two children from Edwin as she fell unconscious. The knife thrower was now advancing towards the three of them, wielding two knives and spinning them expertly in his hands. It was at this moment that both girls stepped forward in front of their passed out mother, glaring at their enemy.

"You goin' down!" Emma shouted indignantly, taking the best fighting stance she could at her age.

Edwin smirked confidently at the child that was glaring up at him, "Alright then…" He wheeled his arm back and threw a knife towards Emma at lightning speeds, giving the young girl only a few seconds to react.

Emma raised her arms, expecting a disc of aquatic energy to rise from her palms and shield her from the knife, but she never expected what happened. She was suddenly thrown on her backside as two powerful pulses of inky black-purple energy flew from her hands, colliding with the hurtling knife and vaporizing it instantly. The residual power from her attack coiled into a shadowy mist, before fading away itself. She had a new power.

"No fair!" Melinda suddenly squealed in her sister's direction as Emma looked down at her hands in shock at what had just come out of them. "I want that!" She said, turning towards Edwin as he raised his second knife to throw at Emma while she was distracted. Melinda threw her hands out again and again, frowning darkly when nothing came out of her hands. Her sister's powers were her powers. They shared everything! Why not this?

It wasn't until the knife flew at her sister when a blinding ray of golden light burst from her palms, roughly throwing her to the ground as the light reduced the traveling knife into a pile of dust almost instantly, leaving a faint glow around the area it had collided with the weapon before fading away and leaving Melinda and Edwin momentarily blinded by the powerful light.

Phoebe chose at this moment to burst into the tent, immediately assessing the situation and forming a glowing psionic blast in front of her forehead which she fired in Edwin's direction. The moment the psychic energy collided with his head, the man was sent flying across the tent, landing in the muddy ground with a thud and dirtying his glittery tuxedo in the process. "Are you two okay?" She asked, rushing to her two nieces and putting her arms around them.

"Mommy…" Melinda breathed, coming back to reality and realizing that Paige was still bleeding.

"Leo!"

* * *

"Okay, so all three of us have had someone try to kill us today, and all the people that _did_ try to kill us don't remember doing it." Piper began to recap the day's events as her husband finished healing Paige, who had regained consciousness now that her shoulder had been healed. "The last thing the trapeze guy remembers is getting to the top of the tower, Balthazar remembers talking to us before going mad, and that guy…" She pointed to Edwin, who was rubbing his head as Mr. Statall talked to him, "Remembers picking up a knife to throw at Paige. Have I got it all?"

"Aidan said that he's cleared the merpeople of any involvement in last night's attack, and I agree with him. There's no way they could have go to that trailer without someone seeing them. And I didn't find out anything when I went questioning people." Paige piped up, rolling her left shoulder and shooting a light smile of thanks in Leo's direction, "What about you, Pheebs?"

The middle Charmed One shook her head, shivering a little at the thought of her near death experience, "Nope, everyone here just seems really nice, although I have now developed a fear of heights." She added in a dark tone, before turning to her husband with a raised eyebrow, "What did you make of the firebreathers? Were they demons or something else entirely that we have to worry about?"

"They were clean too." The mutant replied, "They're pyrokinetics. Mutants just like you and me. Apparently, the Invincible Man used to help them practice, as, well, he was invincible, so I doubt they did anything that would negatively effect the quality of their routine. The electrokinetics have the same story basically, so it wasn't them either."

"So then why attack you guys?" Leo suddenly asked rhetorically, "I mean, if you haven't made any progress, what's the point in trying to kill you? If anything, that'll make you more alert…" He trailed off as he remembered something that his wife had said before Balthazar had attacked them. "Piper, didn't you say that you had found something in the trailer?"

"Oh yeah!" Piper reached into her coat pocket, pulling out a small plastic bag with a stud earring inside it. "I found it under the table in the trailer when you guys unceremoniously dumped me with all the work of inspecting the damn thing."

Phoebe ignored her big sister as she took the small bag off of her. She opened it up and turned it upside down, letting the earring fall out into her waiting palm. The moment the piece of jewelry made contact with her skin, however, the witch's hand clamped into a fist and her whole body stiffened and went rigid. Images of the past began to flood her mind as the earring triggered a monochrome premonition.

_Alan wearily walked up the two steps that led into his trailer. It was tiring work, being the finishing act of the show. An encore would usually be expected of him, and every time he used his powers, it drained him of a large chunk of his energy. It was the price he paid for having such a powerful ability, but it had got him out of a few bad situations before joining the circus, so he didn't complain about being a mutant._

_He turned to his window and looked out into the empty trailer lot. Everyone was probably shaking the hands of the visitors as they left the tent, but Alan preferred to retire to his trailer immediately, and do his appearances in the daytime before the show. It was the silence that he was now experiencing that was so rare in this place. Taking a deep breath, he turned around to make himself a cup of coffee, his heart skipping a beat at what he saw behind him. "Celeste!" He shouted in surprise, "You scared me… How did you get in here?"_

_The psychic didn't respond, merely staring at him with her deep crimson eyes as she raised her hands, summoning an indescribable amount of heat that burst out into an all out fireball. Thinking fast, Alan took in a breath, his body lighting up with a golden shimmer just as the stream of fire flew at him. It was incredibly hard to keep up his shield against this assault. It felt like he was being hit by every firebreather in the circus. Raising his hand slowly, he reached out for Celeste's face, the fire starting to take effect and disrupting his vision as he grabbed her ear instead, ripping her earring out of her ear and dropping it to the ground._

_Oddly enough, this didn't even seem to faze her, and in a last burst of power, the flames breached Alan's invincibility, going right through his chest and smashing the window that he had been standing in front of in a blaze of heat. He crumpled to the sofa in an undignified heap, dead, before Celeste vanished in a veil of shimmers…_

Phoebe's eyes flashed open as the vision ended, everything about today now making complete sense to her. She had seen that woman skulking around the circus, but never got around to investigating her. "It's the psychic." She said firmly, "… Or, at least, a demon possessing the psychic." She turned to Leo, who usually knew the most about how magic worked, "But how does she have so many powers? I mean, she orbed that net away from under me, blocked my levitation powers, and threw fire through that poor guy's stomach."

The Elder could only shrug in response, "All I can guess is that since she's a psychic, she's used some form of advanced empathy to tap in to all of your powers from afar and use them, or in your case, temporarily strip them. It's a very rare expansion of empathy, only extremely powerful beings possess it." He explained, "The demon obviously knew what it was doing when it chose her as a vessel."

"Oh my God…" Piper breathed, her eyes widening in realization, "Wasn't Emma taking Lorna to and see the psychic?"

Phoebe nodded vigorously, turning to Leo, "Alright, let's go. We'll leave the kids here with…" She trailed off as she looked towards the area the five children had been, her heart instantly beginning to beat faster when she realized that Faith, who was in her baby seat next to Paige, was the only one that hadn't disappeared into thin air.

* * *

Emma toppled to the ground as she was bludgeoned over the head with the large crystal ball by Celeste. The glass sphere smashed on contact, wisps of magical mist flying into the air and vanishing as the ball was no more. Lorna knelt down next to her mother, looking wide eyed at the large bloody gash the redhead now had in her head. "You're next, you little brat…" Celeste growled, calling upon Brennan's powers with her advanced empathy and summoning a crackling net of electricity into her palm.

Lorna wasn't about to take this silently, as a deep red light of psionic energy danced above her eyes, before she swung her head in Celeste's direction and fired the projectile from her head. "Big doodyhead…" She growled as the attack hit her target, reducing the psychic to knees with a scream, gripping her head in agony as she rolled onto her side.

At was at this moment that a large cloud of blue and white lights came down from the tent's ceiling, depositing, Wyatt, Chris, Connor and the twins in their place. "Auntie Emma!" Melinda shouted, racing to her mother's best friend and placing a hand on her shoulder, leaving her cousins and sibling to do the fighting as she fruitlessly tried to heal the psionic.

Celeste stood shakily, pushing her long hair out of her face as she grinned manically at the children that were preparing to fight her. "So, I get to be the demon that disposes the Charmed children, eh?" She said to herself, chuckling a little as she opened her palm, flames burst into life in her hand, "So be it!" She threw her hand forward, a jet of fierce fire cutting through the air towards the main group of kids.

Emma was the first one to make a move, making a similar gesture to Celeste, "Fiya!" She screamed at the top of her lungs, calling for the element with her telekinetic splashing. Instantly, the fire seemed to evaporate into a body of water that collected in the young girl's hand, becoming a sphere of moisture before she threw her hand back out again. Emma was surprised at the power of the fire that burst from her palm, nearly throwing her to the ground like the emergence of her umbrakinesis had.

"Melly, let me…" Wyatt said gently, kneeling down next to the eldest Emma as Celeste tapped into Melinda's powers and negated the flames flying towards her with a net of glowing orbs. A golden glow burst from the boy's hands and slowly started to knit up the hole in the psionic's head as Lorna watched on with a hopeful gaze, silently pleading that Wyatt had enough power to save her mother.

"You stupid brats…" Celeste growled, dropping the shield of orbs as the flames dissipated, sweeping her arm down from its raised position and glaring heatedly the children, who were far from done yet.

"Don't call uth brats, you old hag!" Connor shouted, raising his own hands and releasing two powerful bolts of lightning that lit up the small tent as they streaked through the air at a phenomenal rate. The psychic didn't have time to raise any sort of defense, and snipered to the ground as the blast hit her head on, causing her to spin as she crashed to the ground, smoke rising from her baggy clothes and her body twitching from the powerful jolt that had passed through her body.

"Good job, Connor!" Chris shouted enthusiastically, stepping in front of his younger cousins and staring determinedly at the rising psychic. The demon inside of her seemed to be losing its temper, and had finally resorted to its demonic powers, bringing forth a generic fireball in her palm and hurling it towards the kids. Chris smirked, squinting his eyes underneath his messy brown hair and telekinetically sending the fireball back at its user, making it crash into Celeste's shoulder and leaving a bloody, smoking injury.

"You goin' down!" Melinda suddenly shouted, copying the phrase her sister used earlier and throwing her hands up at Celeste. Blinding photokinetic light burst from her palms and plowed into Celeste's chest, throwing her back a few feet before she once again crashed to the floor, seeming to be unconscious. The children cheered at their first victory against a demon, and even better, they had done it completely without the adults!

Their celebration was cut short however when a low laugh was heard across the tent. "Fools… I'm not down just yet…" Celeste said wearily, staggering back to her feet, swaying as she stood and smirking at the children, who were now out of ideas of how to stop this woman.

Wyatt, having finished healing Emma, got to his feet, his expression thunderous, "That's it!" He shouted, turning his head and staring at the large Tarot card on the wall. On it, an angel lay across the picture, his arms crossed over his chest, with the word 'Judgment' written underneath. A golden shimmer passed over the enlarged card as Wyatt called upon his powerful ability of thought projection, bringing the card to life to finish this fight once and for all.

Slowly, the angel that had been on the card began to come out of it, becoming a living being. He placed his hands on the sides of the card, pushing himself out of it and gracefully landing on the damp grass underneath him. The children looked on in awe as the divine being walked towards Celeste confidently, spreading his large, pristine white wings as it passed by the kids, as if to protect them from what was about to happen.

"No… no!" Celeste screamed, paralyzed on the spot as the angel walked right up to her, his handsome face stoic as his large wings swooped down and closed in around her, covering her completely and masking his face. An aura of white light seemed to surround them as the angel worked his magic, before suddenly exploding in a spray of pearly white feathers that floated down to the ground. Celeste was still standing there, seemingly frozen, before she collapsed to the ground. This time, she didn't get up.

Almost immediately afterwards, Mr. Statall burst through the flap in the tent, racing towards his employee and kneeling down beside her, his face falling when he didn't find a pulse, "Did… did I kill her?" The tall man turned around to see Wyatt, staring at the dead body on the verge of tears, "I didn't… I didn't mean to kill her. I-I-I just meant to vanquish the demon!" He cried out, apparently convinced that he had been the cause for the woman's death.

Mr. Statall was quick to comfort the distressed boy, "She was dead the moment the demon took her over… It pushed her body further than it could go. She was always going to die the moment the demon was vanquished… If anything, you saved her from a life of imprisonment, and I know she'll be eternally grateful to you for that." He stood up, his head brushing the top of the tent as he sighed sadly, "Children shouldn't have to learn the lesson of death, but it seems all of you are well versed in its cruelty…"

"Will my Mommy wake up?" Lorna suddenly asked quietly, stroking her mother's deep red hair as she knelt in the damp grass, her dress getting wet as they absorbed all the moisture.

"She'll be fine; she'll wake up in a few minutes. And bravo to all of you for defeating such a powerful demon, but you need to get back to your parents now. They're worried sick about you!" Not giving the kids a choice in the matter, Mr. Statall clapped his hands together and they all suddenly burst into a shower of flamboyant, colourful sparks, leaving the man to look down upon the corpse of his employee, "Such a tragedy…"

* * *

Phoebe rolled her eyes as she got out the car, looking in at her husband, who was sitting in the driving seat. "C'mon, Brennan…" She began, opening the passenger seat to pick up Faith from her baby seat and let to Connor slide out of the car after, "It's pitch black, there's no one outside. No one is going to see you in that get up." She assured him, smirking a little when Brennan slowly began to emerge from the car.

"I still can't believe you hid my clothes…" He growled bitterly, looking down at the costume he had had to wear during the show. The luminous purple pantaloons stopped around his ankles, as he had been too tall for them, and the waistcoat of the same colour barely went on his shoulders, exposing his chest almost completely, "I mean, it's bad enough that I had to do the show in these, and now you're making me walk around in public like this?"

"If you're so bothered, then why don't you make the six feet dash to the door and let your son in before any of the neighbours see?" Phoebe said with a slight giggle as she watched him walk awkwardly towards the door. "Besides, you didn't hear Aidan or Leo complaining about their costumes." She said with an innocent smile, deciding not to tell him that his clothes were in the trunk of the car.

"That's because Aidan's costume vanishes the moment he dries off! And he carried it with a smallest bit of dignity." Brennan argued back, fumbling with the keys. "I mean, even Leo got a better costume than I did, and he was the lead of the show! Aren't they supposed to get the stupidest costumes?"

"I know! I never would have thought Leo would be a lion tamer, but I guess we've all had our surprises today… Oh, give me that!" The middle Charmed One suddenly snapped, snatching the keys from him and quickly unlocking the door, smiling as she walked into the dark house. "See? It's all in the…" She trailed off, seeing that someone was sitting in the living room, looking as if they were waiting on them. "Who the hell are you?" Phoebe blistered, smacking the switch on the wall and turning on the light, her expression softening when she saw who it was.

Nelle Mulwray sat on the sofa, her hands clasped on her lap. Her eyes had turned a fierce red from crying by the looks of things, as she had a box of tissues sitting next to her on the couch. She looked up, silently surveying her younger brother with a look of sorrow. It looked like the slightest movement would cause her to burst into tears once again, with her bottom lip quivering at the sight of her confused sibling.

"Nelle, what…?" He began, but quickly stopped himself as Nelle scrunched up her eyes at the break of the silence. This was when the realization of what must have happened hit Brennan like a ton of bricks, "Mom…"

* * *


	25. Parting Is Such Sour Sorrow

_Okay, where have all my reviewers gone? Guys, if you read this chapter, please review! It doesn't have to be extremely in depth, just a few words or sentences saying what you thought of the chapter. That's all I ask. Okay, now that I'm done with the shameless begging, here's the new chapter. I'm sorry this took so long, but I got my exam results (I did good. Hooray!) and school recently started up again, so I've been really busy. Enjoy!_

**Parting Is Such Sour Sorrow**

Phoebe watched from the window as the people who had come for the wake left in their cars, glaring as the vehicles destroyed the perfection of the newly fallen snow by making a large tear in the perfect white, revealing the ground beneath to be soggy and muddy. It seemed to be a perfect metaphor for this current household. Each Mulwray child, while appearing to have their grief under control and look completely normal on the surface, was actually an ugly mess inside. The house itself had become a victim to Nelle's earthquakes, Allison's floods, Sandra's whirlwinds, and Brennan's lightning strikes. They weren't wrecking the place intentionally, but it was the only way their emotions were able to escape.

David was sitting crossed legged on the floor in front of the fire with Clare and Connor, not caring if the position was creasing his best suit. He was currently playing the two children at 'Snakes & Ladders' while all four Mulwray siblings seemed to be arguing heatedly in the kitchen. Phoebe had decided not to bring Faith along for the journey, choosing to leave her with Paige, as she didn't want the infant to start crying at the funeral, as if she had developed even the slightest empathic ability, she would have been bogged down by all the grief, just like her mother.

"I'm not going!" Sandra suddenly shouted as she stormed the kitchen, a chilly breeze running through the living room as she inadvertently activated her aerokinetic abilities, "I've had it up to here with all this crap! I just _want_ my Mom back!" She screamed, sounding more like a child than the thirty three year old woman that she was as she stomped up the steps, presumably heading to the room she had inhabited before moving out a few months ago.

Brennan, Nelle, and Allison quickly followed her out of the kitchen, watching as their youngest sister vanished upstairs, the sound of a door slamming echoing through the house. Allison cringed as once again; Sandra had let her anger get the better of her. "I'm gonna get started on those dishes…" She said quietly, heading back into the kitchen while rubbing the skin off her hands with a dish towel as she vanished from sight.

"… Is everything okay?" Phoebe asked timidly, knowing that her husband and sister-in-law, now being the two eldest of the family, were being torn apart by their sisters acting so differently to their mother's death. Allison had chosen to take a more silent approach to her grieving, throwing herself into any task before she had a chance to stop and feel the brunt of her feelings, and Sandra had taken a far more vocal way of expressing her emotions, with regular gusts of wind blasting through the house at random times during the night.

Brennan rolled his eyes, expressing how trivial he thought the matter was after everything they had endured today. "… We need to down to the lawyer's office and find out what was in Mom's will. It was supposed to be read at the wake, but then Sandra literally kicked up a storm and… well, you kinda saw what happened." He said, gesturing to the mess that one of Sandra's recent tantrums had wrought on a pile of paperwork in the centre of the room. Every document was now spread across the floor. "We're gonna go and get it read… You know, just to get it out of way."

"Okay… Do you want us to come with you guys and-?"

"No." He immediately cut her off, "Just… stay with Connor, and maybe call Paige to see how my little Faithy's doing." The mutant sighed as he grabbed his thick coat from the hanger at the door, "We'll probably be back in a few hours." He said, opening the door and heading out to his Toyota Land Cruiser, the car that he and Phoebe had brought shortly before Faith's birth.

"Nelle, sweetheart, you are sure you're okay?" David asked, earning a small tap on his knee from Clare as it was her father's turn to roll the dice and move his marker. "Phoebe's right, maybe we should go with you. You shouldn't have to do this alone."

"No, really, just stay with the kids and stay out of Sandra's way." Nelle said with a hint of venom, glaring up the stairs. "You know, I'm tempted to go up there and kick her ass for making this day all about her. I'm also tempted to kick Ally's ass for burying her head in the sand, and I also wanna kick the _weather's_ ass because I really _don't_ want to go out again in that godforsaken snow!" She threw her hand up at the window, before running it through light brown hair with a mournful sigh, "But hey, apart from that…" She stormed towards the door, wrenching it open as Brennan started the car, "… I'm just fantastic!" With that final shout, she slammed the door shut, a minor tremor running in the ground, bringing some of the snow off the roof and onto the decking in front of the house.

David looked down at the board game in front of him, finally coming back to his senses and rolling the dice. "Phoebe, you've known them all for a lot longer than I have… Any tips on how to deal with them when they're like this?"

The Charmed One shook her head slowly, looking towards the window as she watched the car leave the house, "Honestly? I've never seen any of them act this way before, but from what I've seen of all this, I only have one bit of advice." She turned to her brother-in-law, showing that she was deadly serious. "Duck, and take cover."

**XXX**

Pamela felt a wave of relief pass over her as her lecturer dismissed the class and got up from her seat slowly, wrenching her heavy bag from the floor. Thanks to her three month absence, she had had to enroll late for her final year classes, and was currently scrambling to catch up which was proving an increasingly hard task. She would move at one pace at home, only to come into class and find they were still miles ahead of her. The very thought of having to repeat these classes next year was the only thing that spurred Pamela to push on, as she was starting to tire of being tied down by classes and the apparent need for qualifications.

As she shuffled out of the classroom and into the hallway, she was pleasantly surprised to see that McKenzie seemed to have been waiting outside against the wall, "Fantastic!" Pamela instantly exclaimed, dropping half of the books in her arms into McKenzie's arms. "You can help carry these to the subway… That's why you're here, right?"

"No, and you know it." McKenzie replied, staring at her friend through a curtain of curly black hair as they began to walk down the hall, heading towards the entrance. "You really don't remember?" She rolled her eyes when all she got from Pamela was a shake of the head, "I was going to introduce you to my boyfriend! Of course, he has no idea that it's all arranged and that he'll be under a microscope with you around, but still…"

"To be honest, Mac, I just want to go home, have a long bath, and sleep. I swear, between school and my job at the Times, I'm about ready to explode. So, you'll forgive me if I don't have time to dissect your latest beau." Pamela groaned wearily as they exited the building and strolled out into the courtyard, where the remains of a snow fall a few weeks ago was now melting with the slight rise in temperature. She sighed at the look of hurt that spread across McKenzie's face, pursing her lips, "I'm sorry, that came out harsher than I meant. I didn't mean to say that you sleep around or anything."

"It's okay," McKenzie immediately cut her off, a grin spreading across her face as she looked ahead. "Well, it looks like you're not going to get a choice in the matter now… Trent! We're over here!"

"Trent…?" In her whole life, Pamela Walker had only known one person called Trent. Surely, it couldn't be the same one that she was thinking of; there was just no way in the world. She silently mocked her own fear. It was just a name! Why was she getting so scared about someone's name! Besides, there was no way in hell it could be…

"Hey there, beautiful." A familiar voice said. Pamela finally looked up and confirmed her dread, her heart skipping a beat when she saw who was currently kissing her friend. There was no mistaking the small chip in his skin underneath his right eye, where he had permanently scarred himself not thinking ahead when smashing slates of ice outside their apartment building, and his short, spiky black hair. This was Trent Walker, Pamela's foster brother, and only living blood relative to the late Joanna and Stuart Walker.

The revelation sent a terrible jolt through Pamela's body, causing her arms to suddenly jerk and let all the books she had been carrying fall to the damp ground. Not wanting to stick around for a second, she knelt down to the ground, scrambling to pick up her books, before heading off towards the street, ignoring the calls from McKenzie as she walked briskly, resisting the urge to break into a run as she fled the scene.

**XXX**

Piper grimaced as she held the lost dog poster to the lamppost, fishing into her jacket pocket to bring out a roll of tape which she raised to her mouth. After numerous attempts, she was able to grab the tab of the tape with her teeth and pull it forward, tearing the small strip of tape from the roll and slamming it to the top of the poster, sticking it to the post. "Phew!" She blew a piece of her hair away from her face, putting her hands on her hips and admiring her handiwork. "You really need three hands to do this…" She whipped her head around, looking towards her youngest sister, who was finishing up on the other side of the street, "Paige! I'm out of posters!"

Paige looked over to her elder sibling, her porcelain features brimming with a healthy glow from her exertion in the cold. She pouted a little, shaking her head as she made her way across the street. "That's okay; I think I'm done canvassing this part of the neighbourhood anyway. Let's head back and warm up." They began to walk along the sidewalk, heading back to Paige's house while the witchlighter in question looked down at the stack of posters in her arms with a quizzical stare, "Do you think five hundred dollars is a big enough reward?"

Piper resisted the urge to audibly scoff at the question, "Trust me, for five hundred dollars, people are going to be calling in every time they see a _cloud_ that looks like Sandy." She said confidently, believing what she did with a hint of condescension. "I'm surprised you haven't used magic to try and find her, I would have thought that would be your first choice."

"It was." She responded sadly, "But then using magic to find my dog would be personal gain, wouldn't it? I mean, she hasn't been kidnapped by demons, she just ran out after a thief." Paige sighed, putting the stack of posters under her arm. "That'll teach us to go to the circus ever again. I mean, how stupid to need to be to try and bust into a locked house in the middle of the day?"

"This begs the question of whether or not it was actually a demon after all." Piper retorted with a hint of weathered cynicism in her voice. "What about scrying? The only consequence you get from what is a sore arm if you do it for too long with no result."

"Tried that." She abruptly cut in, "It didn't work. Even if you take away the sheer number of dogs in San Francisco, dogs don't really have any sentimental value for anything, so I had nothing to focus the crystal with. And besides, we both know that a demon wouldn't have had to break down to the door to get in." She rolled her eyes a little at the thought of a demon without a transportation power, as there were few of those these days.

"You know, I've been meaning to ask…" Piper began, looking at the whistle Paige had given her with curiosity, "… Just what is this whistle for? Is it in case one of us finds Sandy and needs to alert the other one? Because I gotta tell you, we probably have a better chance of scaring her off with this." She raised it to her lips, preparing to blow into it.

"No! Don't! It's a-," She was too late. Piper blew into the whistle, frowning when she heard nothing come of it, until a string of dog barks suddenly ignited around them, echoing through at least five blocks and setting off every canine in the area. "Dog whistle!" Paige finished, snatching it from her big sister with an annoyed glare, "From now on, your job is to look pretty and put up flyers. Got it?"

"Paige, a dog whistle in suburbia? Seriously?" Piper questioned, her eyebrows raised in shock, "Every single generic household within a ten block radius is going to have a dog. And I think I actually just proved that little statement, so that thing won't do you any good." She caught Paige's slightly irritated stare, realizing what she had just said. "Oh, come on! You know I didn't mean you."

"Yeah, yeah," Paige brushed the notion away as they walked along the street, ignoring the squawks from the seagulls circling above them. These costal neighbourhoods were always plagued by various ailments of the sea. "Just so you realize that my family is far from generic."

"Well, it's certainly a whole lot more generic than my household…"

The witchlighter frowned slightly as they turned out of the street, heading up one of the many hills that San Francisco had been built upon. "Uh oh, I sense a tone. What's bugging you, lady?"

"Nothing… I can't really talk about it with you." Piper said hesitantly, stuffing her hands into the pockets of her jacket and looking at the ground, while Paige put her on her best expression to show mock offence. "Oh, don't look at me like that. You know what happens when you look at me like that. My hands, your neck. Squeezing."

"Aw, come on! Since when could you not talk to me about stuff?"

The eldest Halliwell wrestled with the idea of sharing this with her youngest sister, biting down on her lip before finally giving in. "Alright… it's Emma. She's starting to kinda tick me off. I don't think it's intentional, but she's smothering Lorna like she's afraid I'm gonna slap a restraining order on her or something. I swear, I think she actually sat and watched Lorna sleep all night last night. It's a little annoying."

"Well…" Paige began, finding the task of being impartial hard, seeing as how this was a problem between her sister and her best friend. "Have you tried talking to her about it? I mean, this is Emma we're talking about, she's probably the most docile person on the planet."

"We've seen things to dispute that claim and you know it…" Piper said darkly, "Never mind, it's okay. I'll figure this out myself." Piper said, waving her hands a little to show that she wanted them to be done talking about this particular subject. "So, how's looking after Faith working out?"

"Crushingly depressing and confidence shaking." Paige replied sadly, leafing through the pile of posters in her arms, even though she knew they were all the same. "She starts screaming her head off any time I go near her, so it's Aidan that usually has to deal with her, and that doesn't really work out to the best of our advantage as he's not the one who's unemployed. It's making me feel like a bad parent."

Piper shook her head, dismissing her sister's claim, "Oh, please, you're a great parent. Phoebe wouldn't have left her baby with you if you weren't up for the job. Faith is probably just…"

As the two Charmed Ones walked on, they failed to notice that someone was trying to undo all of their canvassing of the neighbourhood. She was a blond woman, slim and petite with her big brown eyes easily being her most striking feature, as it looked like they consumed the rest of her small face. She ripped the poster from the streetlamp, biting her lip and staring after the Halliwell sisters with a mildly irritated stare. "She never really does give up without a fight…"

**XXX**

"A _guy_? All this has been brought on by some guy? You've gotta be kidding me, because I know that you wouldn't be stupid enough to throw it all away over a quick fling!"

"That isn't what this is about! It's just help put things in perspective a little bit. It isn't just over this guy, because I realize it probably won't work out, but when I want to settle down one day, and I don't want to be weighed down by-,"

"What? Your heritage? Everything that you've ever known since your childhood? You're twenty one; just because you can drink, that doesn't mean you have the knowledge to properly make a life changing decision."

"And what makes you even think that you have the knowledge to shout me down about this? You're a married to a Charmed One! You don't have the slightest idea about the gap between magical beings and mortals when it comes to love. If anything, you're even _more_ ignorant than I am!"

"Oh yeah? Well, I'm older, so I know better!"

"You are being _such_ a prick!" Skye bellowed, putting her hands on her hips as she glared daggers at the man she had considered a big brother all of her life. She had to admit, he was picking one of the worst times to suddenly go protective on her, and it wasn't helping with her decision at all. "Look, you know what, Aidan? This choice has absolutely nothing to do with you. I came here, hoping you would give me some support, but it really doesn't matter, because I'm gonna do it no matter what you say!" In a sudden display of immaturity, the air elemental spun on her heel, her long hair smacking Aidan in the face when she turned and stormed out of the kitchen, heading towards the front door.

"Oh no you don't!" Aidan shouted, also no longer acting his age as he rushed after her, a thunderous expression etched across his face. He didn't even realize that Piper and Paige were walking up the driveway. "Fine! Go and give up your powers! See if I care!"

"Good!" Skye shouted back, wrenching the door open just as the two Charmed Ones were about to enter the house themselves. She looked Paige, attempting to calm herself so she didn't lose her temper at someone who didn't even deserve it. "Your husband…" She growled, stabbing the air with her finger in Aidan's direction, "Is a colossal ass!" With that final insult, she pushed past Piper and headed for her car in front of the house.

"Always a pleasure, Skye!" Paige shouted back sarcastically, turning to her husband with wide eyes, clearly curious about what had sparked such a passionate reaction from the young woman, who was usually very calm. "Uh… you mind explaining that little outburst to me?" She asked, setting down her batch of flyers on the foyer table.

"Actually, yeah, I kinda do." He said flatly. His tone was enough for Paige to realize that she shouldn't push the issue any further. "Well, what happened? Did you get any luck?"

"No…" She replied wearily, shuffling over to him and falling into his awaiting arms, letting out a tired sigh as he rubbed her back, oblivious to the silent envy Piper was radiating, as the situation with Cid Bugle made created an uncomfortable atmosphere around her and Leo. "It's ridiculous. I mean, how hard can it be to find a dog? We've got the advantage when it comes to brains…" Paige stated, showing that it wasn't just her children that were upset by Sandy's escape.

Piper offered her youngest sibling a sympathetic smile, at a loss at how else she was supposed to comfort her. "Paige, why don't we just use magic? What's the worst that could…?" The eldest Charmed One's voice trailed off as she focused on a faint sound she was hearing from the outside. Stepping over the threshold of the open door, she realized that it was getting louder, and as it did, Piper was able to identify it as dogs barking, or to be more precise, a _lot_ of dogs barking. "Oh, there had better not be a banshee abou-,"

She didn't even get to finish her sentence, as the source of the noise suddenly flooded into the house. Hundreds of dogs, each of different size and breed, ran into the foyer, heading straight for the stairs and barking loudly as they went. The odd thing was that they didn't seem to register each others' presence, or that of the three shocked people who were nearly stampeded in the rush to get upstairs. It was unlike anything Piper or Paige had seen in their whole lives as witches.

"Oh my God! The girls!" Paige's eyes widened with fear, bolting towards the stairs to make sure that her daughters and Faith were okay with the sudden rush of dogs in their house. It wasn't until she was halfway up the staircase that her mouth coiled into a scowl of anger and realization. "The girls…" She repeated with a hint of rage, resuming her journey upwards and stomping up each step with Aidan and Piper not far behind.

Sure enough, most of the dogs had ran into Melinda's room, while the others that couldn't get in pushed hungrily at their competition, snarling and growling, but never actually attacking one another. It was with careful stepping that Paige maneuvered herself into her daughter's room, seeing her two children in the centre of this canine fiasco, their sparkling emerald eyes scanning over the animals to see if they had summoned the one they were looking for. "Sandy! Sandy!" Emma shouted, getting down on her knees and looking at the dogs' individual collars.

"Piper!" Paige shouted over the din of barking, still trying to reach the twins. "A little help here please!"

"Oh! Sorry…" The eldest Charmed One replied, smirking a little as she flicked out her hands in the direction of the main collect of dogs, causing them all to instantly freeze in the position Piper had caught them in when her power activated. "I guess this is the reason why we should use magic…"

"I'll go make sure Faith is okay." Aidan announced, silently glad for the excuse to leave, as he knew he would end up falling for his children's charms and not punishing them at all for their misuse of magic. From the moment they had been old enough to misbehave; Paige had been the only one that had the conviction to go through with a reprimand.

"Alright, you two, reverse this spell, _now_." Paige growled, the last word rolling threateningly off her tongue as she looked down at daughters in the midst of the frozen animals. "It's either that or Auntie Piper won't make you a cake for your fourth birthday party." She said, looking to her big sister for confirmation on this threat, but only got a wide eyed stare in response.

"No! Not till Sandy comes!" Melinda shouted defiantly, folding her arms theatrically folding her arms which prompted Emma to do the same.

"You've got _more_ dogs coming?" Paige asked, acquiring a wide eyed stare of her own. "Alright then, if you reverse the spell yourselves, I'll go light on the punishment for using your powers like this. If I'm forced to reverse it myself, just remember you brought it on yourselves." She cocked her eyebrow, setting her hands on her hips, "So, what's it going to be?"

Melinda and Emma looked at one another, silently debating whether or not to accept their mother's offer. They nodded sadly at each other, holding hands and beginning to chant with an angry glare directed at Paige. "Doggies, doggies, go away… 'cause Mommy's bein' mean today!" The moment the words had left their lips, a pulse of magical energy spread from the two of them, sweeping every dog away in a mystical white flash of light and revealing a mass of paw prints in the recently laid carpet in Melinda's room.

"Paige?" Aidan walked back into the now clear bedroom, holding Faith in one arm while carrying a piece of paper and a baby bottle in the other. He handed the paper to his wife and proceeded to need his niece, "I found that on the table in the living room when I went to go warm the bottle. Lemme tell you, the only good thing about having to wear glasses full time is that I don't have to hunt for them when I want to read something…" He said lowly, now having to wear his glasses permanently due a further deterioration in his eyesight.

Paige quickly scanned what the note said, her face falling and her expression darkening as she did. "Maybe it was demonic after all…" She said quietly, giving the note to her big sister so she too could process it.

_If you want to see your dog again, come to Golden Gate Park after sundown._

_Come alone._

**XXX**

Phoebe stuffed her hands into her pockets as she walked into the large barn, her breath swirled in front of her in the cold hair, spiraling into nothing when it reached a certain point. As always, the old barn reeked of the unique odor of wood, hay, sweat, and animal discharge. It wasn't a particularly unpleasant scent, but it wasn't something she was fond of either. Phoebe suspected that the reason the Mulwray kids were able to spend so much time in here was because they had grown up around it.

Brennan and Nelle had returned half an hour ago, and yet it had been only Nelle to enter the house. The eldest Mulwray sibling had then retreated to her room with David closely behind, presumably, and hopefully, to let go of the grip she had on her emotions, and let it all out. Whether it be through crying, shouting, or just wreaking the place, Phoebe was convinced Nelle had overcome her barrier. Brennan, on the other hand was a different.

The middle Charmed One jumped a little at a loud clang that sounded like metal colliding with stone. Sure enough, as she ventured into one of the stables, she found her husband shoveling hay into a large wheelbarrow while the horse that had been in here previously munched on whatever was in the trough hanging from the wall. Phoebe was immediately shocked at the fact Brennan wasn't freezing. His coat had been slung over the gate of the stable, along with his suit coat. His shirt sleeves were rolled up past his elbows, and his face was blazing red. Whether that was from the work he was doing, or the bitter cold, Phoebe couldn't tell. "Um… Brennan, I think you should come inside. It's freezing out here."

"I'm fine." He immediately responded sharply, stabbing the pitchfork into another mound of soiled hay as he did. "I've worked up a bit of a sweat, so I'm not even cold." He tossed it into the large wheelbarrow, giving Phoebe a questioning stare, "If you think it's so cold, what are you doing out here?"

She blinked as her jaw dropped, clearly taken aback with the way he was speaking to her. It was as if Brennan thought of her as a friend he had once been close with, not his wife of four years. "I came out here to make sure you're okay. You hardly got any sleep last night so I don't think you should be overexerting yourself too much…" Phoebe replied, frowning with concern. She knew that he hadn't slept the previous night, choosing to pace around the room.

Brennan gritted his teeth, his irritation apparent as he stood his pitchfork next to him, "Phoebe, I'm telling you, I'm perfectly fine. Why don't you go back inside and leave me to it."

"Because I'm worried about you." She stated, fidgeting with her fingers as she tried to find the right words to explain her thoughts, "I… don't think you're dealing with this in the right way."

That did it. Brennan threw his pitchfork to the ground, the sharp clang spooking the horse a little and causing it to neigh in fright. Phoebe also tensed at the sound. "Well, how the hell _should_ I be dealing with the fact that my mother's dead? You know nothing, Phoebe! Absolutely nothing! You were two when your mom died, so you can't even imagine what I'm going through right now!"

She tried to hide the clear hurt in her eyes at what he had just said, shaking her head slowly, "I'm… not going to talk to you when you're like this." Phoebe stated strongly, glaring heatedly at him as she began to turn away, clearly upset. If being angry at people was his way of dealing with things right now, she would allow it, but she wasn't going to stand there and take it. She could sense his overwhelming grief underneath all the anger; and she hoped it wouldn't be long until it surfaced and allowed him to move on.

"Good riddance…" Brennan growled under his breath, picking up the pitchfork once more and nearly hurling it into the mound of hay, glad to be alone with his thoughts once more.

**XXX**

Pamela wearily pushed the door to her apartment open, taking the keys from the lock as she did. The witch looked up, her eyes widening in shock at the sight of Dean, her younger brother, sitting on the couch, apparently in the middle of a conversation with Keith. She threw her hands up, clearly exasperated as she slammed her keys down on the kitchen counter. "What the hell? Did I miss the memo for a family reunion or something?"

"Okay, wow, not exactly the reaction I was going for…" Dean said, flashing her a toothy grin. It made Pamela realize just how much he had changed from the nervous child who would barely ever crack a smile. He was now confident with his looks, his life, and generally himself. At times, Pamela could find this verging on arrogance, but it was good to know he no longer lived in fear. He had also grown a foot taller than her, which made her feel a little self-conscious, since she usually had to look up to see his face.

"Sorry, it's just been a very long day." She said, smiling at him as he rose from the sofa to meet her, "Hi." She greeted him, putting her arms around his tall frame as he bent down to hug her, "So, just what brings you to my side of the country?" The witch asked, curiosity in her eyes.

She didn't seem to notice the flash of sudden panic in her brother's eyes as she asked this question, "Why else? To see how you're doing… Okay, that and I'm thinking of coming to school here next year after I graduate, so I was hoping I could… um… maybe stay here while I sort stuff out?" He gave her a nervous grin when he saw the shock in her face. She was about to refuse, "I've already cleared it with your boyfriend. He's seems fine with it."

"He's not my boyfriend." Pamela immediately, folding her arms and narrowing her eyes a little, "And what about school in San Francisco right now? Surely they're not going to let you just up and leave for the rest of the year, especially with SATs and stuff like that. It's probably best you stay there and not here."

Dean shook his head, obviously having prepared for Pamela to say something like that. "It's all pretty much revision until I sat my SATs. I can finish the rest of the year in a school here somewhere…" He could see she was opening her mouth to protest, so he cut her off before she could. "My GPA is phenomenal, I'm not upset about leaving my friends, because, well, I was leaving San Francisco anyway, and it would only be until I graduated. I would get a job after that…"

Pamela seemed to be genuinely taken aback by this. She looked towards Keith, who had been watching this exchange with an amused smile on his face, "What about you? This is _your_ apartment after all. How do you feel about my brethren running amok around here?" She raised an eyebrow, irritated when he threw his hands up in defeat, leaving her to make the decision.

"Hey, I don't have any problems with it." He replied, shrugging; secretly glad at the thought of having someone to break up the awkwardness between him and Pamela. "We have a spare room lying there not being used, and I don't think your brother's going anywhere anytime soon, so you may as well keep him within watching distance."

"Don't encourage her!" Dean said jokingly, although silently hoping he wouldn't have his sister's eyes on him all the time while he stayed here, "C'mon, big sis. You can't say no to family… please?"

Pamela ran her tongue along her teeth, looking between Keith and Dean, before finally rolling her eyes. The two of them would probably appreciate each other's company, and Pamela didn't get to see as much of her brother as she wanted, so she made her decision. "Alright, fine!" She didn't get to say anymore, as Dean suddenly lifted her from her feet and into a tight bear hug to show his happiness, causing her eyes to bulge as her air supply was cut off. "You're crushing my spine!" She groaned, prompting him to set her back down on the floor.

"Alright, I'm gonna go unpack the rest of my stuff!" He said excitedly, running down the hall to where his room would be. Pamela let out a small laugh. They had known she would say yes, hence why all of her brother's stuff was already here.

"Am I really that predictable?" She asked Keith, who grinned.

"Well, I kinda figured that you wouldn't leave your own brother out on the streets, and I really do have no problem with it." Keith said, smiling down the corridor, "Besides, he seems like a nice guy. No way near as fierce as you though, which is a good thing." He smirked a little, "Okay, I'm gonna go get my cell. I'm meeting Carmine for an early dinner." He informed her, heading in the direction Dean had a moment earlier.

"Okay," She glared at his back, shaking her head a little. "And fierce? I'll remember that the next time you want me to get rid of a telemarketer." There was a knock at the door. The very thought of having visitors made Pamela's spirits plummet. "That better not be someone _else_ looking to move in…" She groaned, moving towards the door and pulling it open, her eyes widening with fear as she saw who it was. Immediately, she tried to slam the door back in his face, only for him to press a hand against it, stopping her.

"We need to talk." Trent said lowly, applying pressure on the door and slowly forcing it open. Pamela gritted her teeth in frustration. While physically stronger than most people, she was having no luck against Trent's brute strength. "Pammy, come on-,"

"_Don't_ call me that!"

"Please!"

"Hey!" Keith came out of the hallway as he was putting his jacket on, frowning darkly at the scene he had walked in on. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" He snarled, shoving Trent back into the hallway with a forceful push. "Are you alright…?" The mutant laid a hand on Pamela's shoulder, taking his eyes briefly off their intruder to make sure she wasn't harmed in any way.

"Yeah, I'm fine.

Trent composed himself, resisting the urge to retaliate against Keith. "Look, buddy, if you don't mind, me and Pam have got some things to discuss. It's important." He shot her a look of silent pleading, "C'mon, Pam, how about you call off your boyfriend and we talk?"

"He's not my boyfriend!" Pamela replied with an exasperated tone. What was with everyone suddenly assuming that she and Keith were an item? It hadn't even happened that much when they were a couple. "You can go…" She murmured to the propulsion mutant next to her. "It's okay, I'll be fine. He won't lay a finger on me or anything like that."

"Are you sure…?"

"Yeah. Go before you're late. The last thing you need is to explain to Carmine why you were late in the first place."

Keith knew she was right. Carmine hadn't been too thrilled at the fact Pamela was staying with him, especially since Pamela was usually coming out of the shower, wrapped in just a towel, whenever Carmine came to the apartment. Whether this was deliberate, he couldn't tell. "Alright…" He conceded, passing by Trent, their shoulders colliding as he headed for the elevator.

"Look, I'm sorry for showing up at the college. If I had known that Mac was talking about you, I would have found a gentler way to get into contact with you." He explained, a mixture of regret and guilt shining in his eyes before he averted them downwards, looking down. "I'm ashamed that I didn't even recognize you until Mac told me your last name…"

"Eight years can change _some_ people." She spat venomously, folding her arms, noticing that he didn't even look that different. "Apart from a little more stubble, you look exactly the same."

"Yeah, well, I was eighteen back then." Trent replied in his defense, smiling a little, "I didn't have much changing left to go through. You and Dean on the other hand… well, I don't think I would even recognize Dean in the street if I bumped into him. How is he anyway? Anything like I remember him?"

"He's eighteen." Pamela answered stonily, a sneer spreading across her face. "He hasn't got much changing left to go through."

"Hey, Pam, how come Keith's is the only room that as en suite?" Dean asked brightly as he came out into the living area, his head down as he looked at the screen of his cell phone. "I mean, I know it's his place and all, but…" He finally turned his head up, his face draining of all colour when he saw the man standing just inside the doorway. "Trent…?"

Trent grinned, immediately remembering this kind of reaction from every time Dean had been shocked by something during his childhood. Namely his expression on Christmas morning. "Hey, Dean." He smiled fondly at his little brother, "I've missed you… I've missed _both_ of you."

"Oh yeah?" Pamela snorted, losing a hold on her temper. How dare he suddenly come back into their lives, all smiles and love, when he had just completely missed the hardest parts of their lives. "If you missed us _so_ much, then I just have one question for you, Trent: Where the hell were you? Your parents, our foster parents, were dead. Dean had vanished because he couldn't control his demonic half, and I was evading Social Services and ducking the law so I could keep looking for him without interruptions. So just where were you when we _needed_ you?"

Trent's mouth opened and closed a few times as he struggled to try and put together an answer. "I had been away the week my parents died… By the time I was contacted, you two had already disappeared. I don't have any of the special powers you guys have! I didn't know where the hell to start looking for you!"

"Dean was ten, I was thirteen. How hard could it have been to track down a couple of kids who didn't even know what they were _doing_?"

"Pam, stop…" Dean protested quietly, sadness quickly draining him of his cheerful attitude.

"I'm sorry." Trent admitted, shrugging a little and letting out a sigh. "I don't know what else I can do… It's not as if I can go back in time and fix things."

Pamela resisted the urge to laugh at this, knowing full well that if she truly wanted do, she could send his consciousness back into his past self's body so he could undo all of his mistakes, but she didn't have the energy, and she still hadn't had her bath. "I'll tell you what you can do. You have leave, and disappear. It seems to be the only thing you're actually _good_ at."

The eldest Walker sibling pursed his lips, staring into Pamela's eyes, which had transformed into icy blue orbs the moment he had walked through the door, "Okay then…" He replied quietly and sorrowfully, turning on his heel and walking out of the door, feeling Pamela's glare on his back as he did. "I'm sorry…"

"Are you really going to let him just leave like that?" Dean asked desperately, striding towards her as she still stared out the open door. "I mean, he's our brother!"

"We did fine without him, didn't we?"

"Yeah, but…" He sighed, knowing that he would never get through to her about an issue as delicate as this, especially since she was still fueled for a fight. Dean bit his lip, looking between Pamela and open door, before running into the hallway, "Trent! Wait up!" He called out, jogging down to the hall to catch his eldest sibling at the elevator.

"Dean, don't!" Pamela shouted, making a step towards the door, only to have Dean slam it shut on his way out. Once again, her shoulders drooped, along with her head, as she let out a groan of annoyance. "It's the _other_ side of my family that's supposed to be the dysfunctional one!"

**XXX**

Ruth McKenzie rolled her eyes as she opened the door, surveying the man on her doorstep with a narrow eyed stare. She raised an eyebrow at his guilty expression; he knew he had done wrong, and she certainly hoped that he was here to try and make amends for his actions. "Aidan Parker…" She growled, shaking her head and intensifying her disapproving stare. "I dunno whether to hug you, or slap the hell outta you! Do you know she came in this door a wreck? I don't like to see that on the rare occasion my daughter stops by from college."

"So she's here?" Aidan asked hopefully, bringing his head up before dropping it again at the sight of Ruth's cold glare. She always knew how to make him feel like a five year old who had been caught with his hand in the cookie jar. "Can I see her please? I'm here to apologize if that helps…"

The former air elemental glared at him once more before stepping out of his way, "She's upstairs, you big idiot." She said fondly, shaking her head with a smile as he past. "I'm telling you, you're lucky you're pretty, Aidan. If a butt ugly guy had upset my daughter that much, I wouldn't have cared about mangling his mug."

Aidan laughed a little as he vanished up the stairs, remembering where Skye's room was from when he used to read her bedtime stories when she was a little girl. Her father hadn't been around at all, so it had been up to Aidan and Matt to fill the void of a fatherly and brotherly presence, so she had been the one to take Matt's death the hardest. "Skye…?" He called out gently, knocking on the door. He got no answer. "Look, Skye, I'm sorry about earlier. I was a total jerk. Please let me in." There was a pause, "Sk-,"

"… It's open." A muffled voice called from behind the door.

Taking that as an invitation, Aidan entered the dark room to find that it had changed drastically from the little girl's bedroom he remembered. Everything was now in boxes which were no doubt filled with the things Skye hadn't taken to her dorm. The only thing that remained was the bed and a bare mattress, on which the young woman in question was sitting. "Do you remember when this was taken?" She croaked, her voice clearly effected from hours of crying.

Aidan looked down at the photo album that was open on her lap as he sat down next to her. "Um… yeah." He replied, smiling at the memory the photo sparked. "That was your eighth birthday party. The clown that your Mom had booked didn't show up, so Danielle had to put on a make shift fire show… which ended with your cake being blown up." He looked down at the picture of all the children with shocked expressions, each one covered in cake.

"I liked Danielle… you know, before she went mad and tried to kill your kids. Not so fond of her after that. Hell, she even went after me and Grant when we tried to stop her." She turned the page, looking at more photos of her childhood. "She broke my arm in that fight… or, wing, as it was at the time. I ended up missing singing auditions for the choir for the third year in a row, every time due to elemental related injuries…"

Aidan remained silent. He remembered going to the church Skye used to sing at as a child at Christmas. Even at a young age, she would always get a solo performance, and every time it would be beautiful to hear her sing. "I'm sorry… if I had known-,"

"You would have fought tooth and nail to get me an audition." She finished for him, smiling a little. "I know you would, which is why giving up my powers is the hardest decision I have ever made." She looked back down at the photo album, "This is from when you took me on your fire truck… you let me wear your hat."

"And put on the siren, much to the displeasure of my boss." He added with a grin.

She laughed a little, her eyes widening as if her point had just been proved. "See! This was one of the main reasons I thought about trashing the whole idea. I was afraid that I would lose this relationship we have… that we wouldn't stand the test of time without magic linking us. And something tells me you thought the same thing when I told you today."

"What made you change your mind?"

She smiled wistfully, showing intelligence far beyond her age. "Because I believe that we can survive if we try." She closed the album, turning to face him properly. "Look, Aidan… I don't still want to be in charge of the world's wind when I'm your age. I know you love it, and once upon a time, so did I… but I just don't think I can do this anymore. I don't have the strength like you do." She looked up a little, her eyes shining in the moonlight. "I want, for lack of a better term, a normal life…"

He didn't say a word. All he did was lean over and wrap his arms around her, pulling her into a tight hug. "Okay…" He said softly, "If it's what you really want…" He added softly, not needing to hear a verbal response from her to know how she felt. "I really am sorry for being an ass earlier."

She smiled as they pulled apart, "Its okay… Oh, and I'm sorry for calling you a prick."

"That's alright. I've been called worse."

"Oh yeah? What?"

"… Pretty!"

**XXX**

"I'm glad you decided to come out with me." Trent said happily as he and Dean stood in the queue at one of the many Starbucks that were littered in the city of Manhattan. The two of them stepped forward as the line got shorter. "Although… I'm guessing Pam wasn't too thrilled when you just ran out without even telling her." He smiled a little when he saw his brother shrug, pretending not to care.

"It's not as if she can just tell me what do. If I want to see you, I'll see you." He said in a matter of fact tone, convinced that he was right. "I know that it's been me and her against the world for most of our life, but things are different now, better. She doesn't need to keep me within her sight. And if you ask me, she's passing up a great opportunity. I mean, before the Walkers died, the three of us had so much fun together! Doesn't that count for anything?" He asked, moving forward a little again.

Trent shook his head slowly, smiling guiltily, "Don't be so hard on her. The way she sees it, I completely abandoned you guys when you needed your big brother the most. I can understand why she's so angry. If I were her, a few memories of tormenting Mrs. Winchester wouldn't make everything all better either." They reached the top of the queue, quickly making their orders. When Dean began to feel around in his pockets, Trent lay a hand on his shoulder, stopping him. "It's on me…" He said, pulling a twenty from his pocket and handing it over to the cashier.

"Thanks," Dean replied, smiling proudly, "See? You're not the bad guy Pam makes you out to be!" He said brightly, taking his coffee to go as it was handed to him. "She's just blowing all of this way out of proportion."

Trent chuckled a little, taking his order. "Well, Pammy's always been a little intense."

"I told you not to call me that."

The two of them turned around to see Pamela standing to their side, armed with the same icy stare she had had when confronting Trent in the apartment. Her arms were folded over in a classic defensive position. She cocked her head to Dean, her eyes flickering at the coffee in his hand. "I didn't know you drank coffee." She said, a warm smile spreading over her face. "Although I gotta tell you, Starbucks coffee is vile compared to some of the independent places."

"Oh, what? You're taking your jabs through the _coffee_ he buys me?" Dean spat, frowning darkly at his sister. He truly was appalled at how petty and vindictive she was being. "C'mon, Pam, sway a little. It's a frickin' cup of coffee."

"Dean, could you please just go to the car outside? We'll talk later." She requested icily, clearly not planning to weaken her resolve anytime soon.

"No."

"Its okay, Dean." Trent said, nodding to Pamela's car outside of the store. "I'll catch up with you some other time, but just do as Pam says for now, it'll be easier." He said, giving Dean a look of reassurance to tell him that he wasn't going to be leaving the city anytime soon. "I'll see you later." He watched as Dean walked towards the exit, catching the fact that his little brother had given Pamela a vicious glare on his way out. "Happy?"

"Ecstatic." She replied sarcastically, slowly walking up to him. "You need to leave, now. Stay away from me, stay away from Dean, and _especially_ stay away from Mac. I still remember how you treated your girlfriends in high school, and I won't want to see that same damage repeated to one of my best friends." She spun on her heel, heading towards the car, and not even stopping when Trent began to speak.

"I'm not going anywhere, baby sister…"

**XXX**

Paige sat nervously on a bench in Golden Gate Park. It was after dark, and it was cold. Combine that with the only source of light being the moon, and it was safe to say that the witchlighter was thoroughly spooked. Every time she felt herself get a little shaky, she just reminded herself that Piper had it far worse, as she had to hide in the pitch black bushes across the clearing, ready to freeze whoever showed up. She smiled a little, imagining her big sister freaking out at the slightest noise in the darkness.

"Hello, Paige."

It was now her turn to freak out. Paige jumped from the bench and turned to where the voice had come from. She was facing a woman that was smaller than her, which was a positive. She couldn't make out the colour of her hair in this limited light, but her big brown eyes glittered in the darkness, sending a chill down Paige's spine when she realized the woman's eyes were really all that she could see. "Alright, where the hell is my dog, lady?" Her eyes flickered to across the clearing, where she now saw Piper frantically running towards her. "You were supposed to freeze her!" She hissed as the eldest Charmed One reached her.

"I tried! I saw her coming up the path way before you did!" She hissed back.

"Oh, is _that_ what you were doing in the bushes? I thought you were maybe having a toilet break or something." The woman asked, shocking both sisters with her powerful eyesight, "No offence to your hiding skills, Piper, but I saw you a mile off. And for the record, I'm immune to your powers."

"Oh yeah? Are you immune to this?" Paige asked with a growl, shoving her hand into her pocket and pulling out a potion vial, filled to the brim with a bright turquoise liquid. She reared her arm back, scowling, "Where the hell is my dog?"

"I'm your dog!" The woman shouted back, her eyes flickering to the potion in Paige's hand with a glint of fear. "Look…" She then put her hand into her jacket pocket, and pulled out a dark blue collar, just like Sandy's. "Kit sends her regards, by the way." She said, staring intensely at both women.

Paige lowered her potion, cocking her head as she surveyed the woman. "Sandy…?"

She put the collar back into her jacket pocket, looking at Paige with remorse glowing in her large chocolate eyes as she did. "In the furless flesh…" She admitted quietly, taking a few steps towards the two.

"So, you're a familiar?" Piper asked.

"The kids' familiar, to be exact." Sandy corrected her, "And not just to the twins, to all of them. I was charged to make sure that they stayed on the right path during an impressionable time in their lives. The moment they vanquished the demon at the circus, it proved that they all had the character to go it alone after that." She pursed her lips, looking a little saddened at the fact that she wasn't needed in the family anymore. "Sorry about breaking your lock, but you had locked the house up tight, and I changed into a human the moment the demon was vanquished, so you couldn't exactly come home to find a strange woman in your house."

"But… your puppies." Paige suddenly said, clearly having trouble trying to accept this fact. "What about them?"

"They'll all become familiars eventually." Sandy replied simply, "I'm not even done yet… I'm gonna move on to my next charge, but I couldn't move on, until _you_ had moved on."

"What?"

"Do you really think I could go on the next person I supposed to watch over with you putting up lost dog flyers everywhere?" She exclaimed, breaking the somber atmosphere. "I mean, I hate being in this human form, but I have to stay in it until I move on to my next charge." She held her hands up, scrunching up her face as she looked at them. "How do you guys get used to _thumbs_?"

"Well, that explains why letter was written crappily…" Piper murmured to herself.

"So… what? You want me to just stop looking for you?" Paige asked, frowning in confusion. "I don't get this. I mean, what the hell am I supposed to tell the kids?"

Sandy frowned at the question, before coming up with a suitable reply. "Oh, I heard that if parents can't find their family dog when it goes missing, they usually tell their kids something like… the dog went to go live on the farm, or something like that." She smiled warmly at Paige, "For what it's worth, you and your gorgeous little girls have given me some of the best memories of my life. Oh, and give Aidan my best, tell him he should really talk to you about what he talked to me about last." She said with a small wink, taking a few steps backwards, "Goodbye… and thank you…"

Paige watched with tear filled eyes as Sandy walked away, vanishing into the inky darkness of the park. She felt Piper put her arms around her lower torso, giving her a gentle hug. She looked down at the ground, letting the tears fall from her face before staring back at the fading silhouette. "Thank you…"

**XXX**

Brennan placed his two forefingers against his temple, holding his head up as he tried to keep his eyes on the snowy road that he was currently navigating. He had been driving in complete silence for the last hour, as Connor had finally submitted to his fatigue after a lengthy game of "I Spy" and had fell asleep in the back seat, and with the radio reception being so poor, Brennan had been left with his own thoughts.

Phoebe, although she had only fallen asleep half an hour ago, hadn't said a word to him since their argument in the barn. He hadn't meant to take such a personal shot at her, but these days, he just didn't know how to act around her. Before his mother's death, she had been icy, yet starting to thaw out from their separation. After the news, she had been there for him, as if he had never done the atrocious thing he had done in the first place. Had she forgiven him? Or was it all just an act out of sympathy?

Either way, it was probably better for both of them if they didn't talk to one another, as dealing with everyone's emotions in the house had left Phoebe with a bad migraine and a short temper, and Brennan just wanted to be left alone so he could figure this out by himself. He didn't even know what he was supposed to be feeling. He hadn't even cried at the funeral, and for some reason this made him angry. Angry at the fact he couldn't honour his mother's memory by expressing some sort of emotion for her passing. What the hell was wrong with him?

A small popping sound awakened him from his deep thoughts, and he let out a groan as he immediately recognized the sound. "Just great…" He murmured, turning the wheel and causing the car to pull over to the side of road. With a tired sigh, he got out of the car to inspect the tires, and sure enough there was a massive slash in the one to the back right. Brennan suspected that they had unwittingly driven over a sharply shaped log. "High durability my ass…"

Trudging around to the trunk, he opened it to find that, bar their luggage from their stay at the Mulwray estate, it was completely empty. They had no spare tire.

After pulling the trunk closed with a little more force than required, he walked back around to the burst tire, staring at it for around a minute, as if he was in a trance. The silent calm of this isolation was soon broken though, as Brennan's face suddenly contorted in extreme anger, and he delivered a solid kick to the tire. "Damnit!" He bellowed, continuing to kick the tire over and over again before punching the passenger side window, causing Connor to awaken with a start.

Phoebe too had been awoken by this sudden bout of noise, she looked back, and watched for a second as her husband continued to kick the car violently, causing it to shake with each hit. Connor watched fearfully from the window as his mother got out of the car. "Brennan!" She called out, moving towards him and latching onto his arm, "Brennan, stop it! You're going to hurt yourself!"

It seemed that during this display of violence, angry tears had begun to stream down Brennan's face. His kicks came less forceful, and eventually, there were nothing but a tap, and the once angry roars came weeping as he fell to his knees in the snow, Phoebe knelling down beside him and gently stroking his cheek as he cried on her shoulder, "I'm so sorry… I've been a crappy husband, a crappy father… I'm so sorry, Phoebe…"

Phoebe, who was silently crying herself, shushed him gently, kissing his temple as she run her hand through his hair, "It's okay, sweetie… just let out all out… it's okay, I'm here. I'm not going anywhere."

"Why? Why didn't she have to die…?" He mumbled, putting his shaking arms around her as they silently cried for different reasons, but the result would be the same. With the two of finally moving on to better days. They sat on the ground for around ten minutes, holding one another in snow, "I think I broke a few of my toes…" He murmured quietly, looking down at his foot.

Phoebe smiled sadly, keeping her hand on his cheek as she kissed him softly on the lips. "It's okay… I'll call Leo. He can orb all this stuff back, especially if we don't have a spare tire." She struggled to help him up to his full height, as he was so much taller and heavier than her. They managed it somehow, and she helped him into the passenger seat that she had been sleeping in. "Brennan…" She began, taking both of his hands and squeezing them tightly. "I promise you… it'll get better."

"I hope so…"

**XXX**


	26. Pam Point Perspective

_Just so you all know, the stuff in italics is future Pam writing in the journal. That's all I have to say, except that I loved writing this chapter, and I love it shines through in my writing! It's not the longest chapter in the world, but I've done everything I wanted to do in it, so enjoy!_

**Pam Point Perspective**

**April 24th, 2024**

I've said this many a time in my life, but at times, men are the most useless creatures on earth. Mind you, I did kinda bring this on myself. Can I plead temporary insanity for even suggesting that the attic needed a clear out? I love Wyatt and Connor, I do, but I also realize that, combined, they have the attention span of a gnat. "Oh sure, Pam! We'll help you clean out the attic! It'll be fun go through all of our old stuff!" Yeah, it was fun… until Wyatt could a call on his cell which required his immediate and undivided attention, and until Connor decided to go out with Lorna and Chris for the afternoon. I always get stuck with the heavy lifting, literally in this case.

With a sigh, I decide that I too, am going to screw my responsibilities for the afternoon. I stride confidently towards the door, a determined frown on my face, but my resolve crumbles at the attic's threshold. Who am I kidding? If I don't clean this mess up, no one will. I certainly hope that there's something interesting in at least one of these boxes, because while seeing just how much of a swat Lorna is from finding her old books from elementary school, there's only so many times you can look at "A+" before it becomes a blur to your eyesight.

Getting down on my knees again, I open up one of the many dusty boxes that have been moved into the centre of the room for sorting and immediately scan for anything remotely interesting. There's a photo album, and I smile when I see a picture of Lorna at her first piano recital. She kicked ass, as you'd imagine, despite the nerves and the near panic attack she had had before performing. This whole box just seems to be filled with photo albums! Score!

I grab the last one out of the box, before noticing that there's one more after it. Although, this one doesn't seem to be a photo album. Picking it up with a quizzical look, a look at the front, not recognizing the aged leather cover, before opening it up, and the memories all start coming back to me. Mainly because they're written down on paper right before my very eyes.

My first journal. I've gone through about seventeen of those since this one, and as I look through some of my entries in this one, I realize just how much I've changed in twelve years. I'd had plenty of reason though, but some part of me wishes that I still had the amount of witty bite I had back then, but people grow up I guess. Even I'm not immune to that.

I've been flicking through this thing from back to front, so it's only now I realize that the first week of it is completely blank. I'm a little disappointed to say the least, as I was hoping to get a laugh out of myself from reading my initial reactions to being given a journal for the first time. I remember I hated the idea, but I still want to see my first entry.

As the reason for this gap in my memoirs finally hits me, a stare at the blank page, my face just as unreadable as I raise my hand to it, and run my finger across a permanent, yet slightly faded scar, which runs from the bridge of my nose, to the centre of my right cheek. My hand then falls to the journal, and I run my hand over the withered paper. I cal recall every single detail of my there's nothing in the first week of my journal, and to be honest, I'm a little worried that I didn't realize immediately.

I remember…

**XXX**

**Present Day**

What a total waste of time.

I'm sitting in a shrink's office, of all places, wasting my precious lunch hour on a "preliminary session". Translation? "I've found a different way to do nothing while charging you fifty dollars an hour." She's staring at me through these outrageous glasses, which I don't think I could even describe if I tried, scribbling notes on the pad in front of her. This is confusing me even more, as I haven't even done a damn thing yet! Apart from sitting down of course. Is she psychoanalyzing me through my posture or something? I cannot believe Emma is even friends with this woman. Isn't there any other magical being with a psyche degree?

Oh well, I might as well mess around with her while I'm here, so I pick up something like looks like a paper weight from the coffee table in front of me, and toss it from hand to hand over my lap. Like I thought, she starts to write even more feverishly, probably something about how I have avoidance and confrontation issues. Some people are so easy to play. "So…" To be honest, I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to say, but hearing that pen scratch over her pad is pissing me off a little, so I need to say something. "… see any good movies lately?" Oh, _God_. Maybe I'm not so good at this after all.

She gives me this smile, which, from my many observations of human behaviour, means one of two things. She's either coming onto me, which would be extremely unprofessional, or she's cut through my bullshit already. Since she's an empath, I'm gonna go it's probably the latter. "Here…" She picks up book from next to her, and casually tosses it onto the coffee table. "Take it."

"What is it?" Yes, I probably could have worded that question a little better without sounding like a total moron, but like I said earlier, precious lunch hour, so I don't exactly have the time to be articulate.

"It's a journal." She tells me, and I seethe as I notice a flicker of amusement in her eyes at my badly put question. I'm gonna kill Emma the next time I see her. "I want you to document the ins and outs of your life for the next week, and we'll take it from there."

Huh, okay, I'll admit I wasn't expecting that. I thought she would at least try to keep me here to get her hour's worth. "Uh… I'm not really a 'Dear Dairy' kind of person, so maybe you could just ask me about me childhood. I have _plenty_ of psycho cannon fodder on that subject!" I was all ready to start talking, but to my extreme annoyance, she cut me off, which is a little pet peeve of mine… actually, it's more of a pet loathing.

"Look, Miss Walker, this is how I work. Emma pointed you in my direction because she believed that with my combined qualifications and powers, I would be able to help you get over some of the…" And there's that damn pause I've been waiting for. Why doesn't she just say 'deep-seated guilt for killing an innocent family' and be done with it? "…problems you've had since your aunts' thirteen year trial. I believe doing this is how I'll be able to help you."

Normally, I'd argue back, but living with two guys has kinda drained me of all the strength I have, so I just silently grabbed the journal and stuff it into my bag. "Fine then," I said, with maybe a little too much resentment, but I'm leaving in the next three seconds, so I don't really care. "I'll see you next week with this puppy all filled out!" And so, with my head held high, and my bank account drained by fifty dollars, I take my leave, and get the hell out of Dodge.

I _hate_ shrinks.

**XXX**

"C'mon…"

"No."

"You'll have fun!"

"No."

"It's a free meal!"

"No."

"Are you going to stop giving me one word answers?"

"… No."

"Pam!" I love it when Jordann takes this tone, because it means that she's about three seconds away from crumbling and hanging up. That's a good thing, as she's called me at work, and my boss hates it when I take personal calls on her time. "Look, I know you have problems with Trent and Bridget, but Mac and I haven't seen you in ages and we miss you."

I roll my eyes, continuing to read over the article that I was given to proofread and make changes when necessary. It's a pretty menial job, but it's a basic journalism job at a respected newspaper, and the pay is good. Bad side? If there's even one typo in the printed version, it's my ass on the line for not noticing the mistake. The idiot reporter who is the comma splice's biggest fan however, is blameless. "Okay, yeah, I have a big problem with Trent, but I don't have any beef with Bridget. What has she said?"

Bridget is basically my replacement in that household. She was the lovely girl who charged in and stole my room when I was thrown out… Yeah, okay, I'm still a tad bitter about it, but can you blame me? It's not like I have a problem with Bridget herself, I just have a problem with the circumstances that brought her into my life. She's a chameleon feral, which, if you ask me, is a pretty useless power. It's the cheap and crappy knock off of invisibility.

There was a sigh on the other end of phone. She was getting pissed off, and I didn't blame her. I would be pissed off if I had to do this conversation from the other side. "No, she hasn't said anything. Look, you need to come! If you don't, I'm going to be the only one that's single out of all seven of us."

"Seven? You mean there's another couple going? I thought you were trying to persuade me to come, not to leave the state."

"Well…" Uh oh, she started the sentence with 'well'. In Jordann language, that means that she has something she doesn't want to tell you, but she's going to tell you anyway. "See, it turns out that Bridget is in a lot of Carmine's classes, so…"

I look at my watch, "Three twenty-seven, the time I got beef with Bridget. I take it she's going be bringing Keith with her?"

"I'm guessing so." She spoke quietly, trying to act like she wasn't making a big deal of the fact that my ex-boyfriend had been completely and utterly whipped by a satanic shrew. "Oh, I have an idea!" Oh joy, a subject change, this should be random. "Bring Dean along! It's about time we met him, and I'm sure he'll love mingling with New York's finest."

"Wow, showing up with my brother who's in high school… You certainly wouldn't be the most pathetic person in the room…" Ah, crap! My boss is coming back, it looks I'm gonna have to just agree to get the pushy rabbit of the phone. "Oh, alright! Fine! I'll be there! Now, get off the phone before I get fired."

"Hooray! Thanks, I'll see you at-," I didn't hear the rest as I was too busy slamming the receiver back down on the base unit before my boss came through the door. I quickly put my headphones back in and turn to the article that looks like it was written by a monkey. I swear to God, the sports articles are where I really earn my pay. Jocks shouldn't write for newspapers.

There's a tap on my shoulder, and instantly tense up. Did she catch me out when I was on the phone or something? Damn, I must be losing my touch. First the shrink, and now my boss, definitely not a good day for me. "The editor wants to see you." She said to me in a very business like fashion, after rudely ripping one of my earphones from my ear.

Shit! The editor was going to fire me? Wow, I must have really screwed up. "Um… Do you have any idea what it's about?" I should have added "Because I sure as hell don't!" But I didn't. As, if I was getting fired, I would want a place where I could get a reference out of.

"No idea." She told me. Thanks for nothing, Maud. "But don't worry, if you were getting fired, _I_ would be the one doing that."

I rose from my desk, leaving my boss who seems to suffer from a superiority complex and headed for the elevator. I could feel the butterflies in my stomach get worse as I was carried upwards, one floor at a time. Not only due to the fact that I had been requested by the editor, but this was going to be my first time in the bullpen of the Grey Lady, better known as the New York Times.

And hell, I wasn't disappointed.

The moment those elevator doors, I was hit with the electrifying atmosphere of a bustling newspaper. Sure, I had been the bullpen of the Bay Mirror many a time when I was meeting my Aunt Phoebe, but that just didn't compare. People were rushing back and forth from different tasks, speaking quickly to one another for a few seconds before moving to another person, while the reporters typed furiously at their computers, looking at pieces of paper on their desks before resuming their frenzied activities. It was like I was watching a "Speed" movie, and if any of these people stopped moving, they would blow up.

Now, if you know me, you'll know that I hardly ever get a case of the shakes, but as I raised my fist to the door of the editor's office, I was nearly vibrating. I knocked, and once I heard a muffled reply from behind the door, I entered.

"You wanted to see me, sir?"

_It's funny. Journals are meant to evolve with their writer, documenting every twist and turn in the person's life with the raw emotion which is the product of the event happening only hours ago. It feels weird to try and write about something that happened twelve years ago, but I will tell you this. The space of time that I spent in that Editor's office, was probably the half hour that set me on the road I've ended up today, as, in a way, everything that's happened up until now was due to what happened in that office. And I wouldn't change a second of it._

**XXX**

"Your own _column_? Oh, I am _so_ proud of you!"

Usually, I never know when to expect a hug from Phoebe. She's an extremely affectionate person, and I'm betting she hugs Brennan if he remembers to put the toilet seat down. In this case, however, I knew it was coming, so I wasn't caught with my arms being crushed into my sides. "Lunch is on me today." She told me and her sisters, grinning at me like I just agreed to bear her only child. "We columnists got to stick together!"

"So, anyway, before Phoebe got here late and forced us to go over old information…" Piper began, seeming to be a little peeved that Phoebe's enthusiasm for my news seemed to overshadow her and Paige's enthusiasm greatly. "You were about to tell us just how the hell this came about. I mean, last I heard, your job was to read over articles before they went to print. What happened?"

"Yeah, you didn't sleep with the boss, did you?" My Aunt Paige, ever the source of dry wit, asked me with a twinkle in her eye that tells me she may have a little experience in that department. It didn't go missed by anyone at the table apparently, and it forced her to elaborate. "I was eighteen, and I worked in 'McDonalds'. My boss was a really hot college freshmen… one thing led to another and-,"

"You became the employee of the month, didn't you?" Piper said suggestively, her mouth curling into an amused smirk. "Sorry, continue."

"Alright. Well, apparently, one of my professors, who did _not_ sleep with!" I said a little too loudly, attracting the attention of the people at neighbouring tables. "… is actually close friends with the editor of the Times. I had mentioned to him that I was working there, doing a primate's job I might add, so the next time he saw the editor, he showed him some of my essays. A week later, I'm sitting in the guy's office, and he's offering me a column to write about the college. According to him, it's important we do something for the local young people."

"Remember when we were considered as young people?" Phoebe asked my other two aunts, a wistful gleam in her eye that told me she was going to launch into a tirade about just how great her twenties.

"Speak for yourself, sister!" Piper boomed indignantly, thankfully saving me from having to hear about life in 90s'. "With only three years to go until I hit that dreaded milestone, I am embracing my middle agedness in all its glory. Forty is the new twenty, you know." There was something in her tone, and in her face, that told me she doesn't believe a word of she just said. I don't mind saying that I don't like the thought of these three getting old, especially since it would mean that I would essentially become the leader of the family while they're off coffin dodging.

"So, wait, if it's about the college, what are you going to do when you graduate in a few months?" Paige asked me, clearly trying to stay well away from the age topic, but I could tell that wasn't because it bothered her, it was because it _didn't_ bother her. Paige has never been that concerned with age. Why should she? She's in her early thirties and that envious complexion of hers makes her seem eternally youthful.

"I actually asked that too." I tell her with a satisfied smile, "He's going to be using what I write about the college as a trial run. If I'm received well, and prove that I can write an article, he'll find me something else to do on a more permanent basis."

All three of them smile at me in a way that, if I wasn't sitting down, I would have fallen to the floor, because the pride is blinding. It's as if they all know that they contributed to making me into the person I am right now, and they're not wrong. If I hadn't found them, I don't know where I would right now. Probably still working at that coffee shop, going to night classes at the community college or something. I know I would have survived, that's what I do, but being with them has just made the last five years so much easier to live though.

"Well, I think this is definitely reason to celebrate." Piper announced, looking at me with a smile, "When was the last time we all went to P3? I think we could all use a night of happiness, what with you being unemployed…" She shifted her gaze to Paige, "… you having a husband who's mourning a loss…" She settled on Phoebe, "… and me having the tensest household in the country. We could use some cheer."

Phoebe mulled it over for a few seconds, and I think I can actually see the gears turning in her head as she goes through every possible scenario that could occur from an outing to P3. We Halliwells are certainly an over-analytical bunch. "Sure, why not? It may even get Brennan out of the house if we have something good to celebrate. Especially since I think he may have quit his job a few days ago…"

"What makes you say that?" Piper asked.

"Well, the hospital has called a few times for him over the last couple of days, and every time they do, he either tells me to tell them that he's not there, or he takes the call into another room and shouts down the phone." When there's a loss in a family, I always try to give a little sympathy to those caught in the maelstrom of grieving people. Phoebe seems to be caught in said maelstrom right now, not knowing what to do with herself or Brennan. "I just… hope he hasn't made any rash decisions while his emotions are running high like this."

I'm usually really crap when it comes to trying to articulate my feelings, but I suppose I'll give it a try. "Oh, c'mon, the newbie's always very grounded, even when it comes to stuff like this. I'm sure you have nothing to worry about."

"Well, I hope so…"

"So, okay, P3. Yay, or nay?" Piper asked me, clearly not wanting to stay on the subject of my emotionally crippled uncle for much longer.

"As much as I would love to, it's going to have to wait until tomorrow night." There's not many people my age that would throw away a night with their friends for a night with their family, but in this case, I would do it in a heartbeat if I hadn't promised Jordann. "I had to go to the dinner party from hell this evening. Hey, maybe you guys could come! That way, a demon's sure to attack and cut the evening short!"

_The Charmed Ones. My three aunts; and the most amazing women that I have ever met, and will ever meet. Although, to tell you the truth, I've never felt like their niece. Perhaps it's the fact that there isn't that big of an age gap between us all, but at times like this, when we were sitting in a restaurant having lunch, laugh, joking, sharing our woes… I felt like one of them, like I was their sister, and not their niece. I didn't know it at the time, but in a kind of way, that was true. Although not in anyway literally, of course! _

**XXX**

God damn.

I must be a glutton for punishment, because I keep coming back here, despite the fact that this place creeps the hell outta me. Some part of me finds it comforting, but the rest of me finds the Walker apartment to be the scariest place I've ever been in my entire life.

The whole place just seems to give off a foreboding sense of death and destruction, as if nothing or no one would be able to live in this environment. I'm probably not that far off with that guess, as even I have trouble staying here for long periods of time. Perhaps it's because I saw this apartment in all its splendor, so seeing it dirty, destroyed and inhabitable is a bigger hit than it should be. That and I'm pretty sure there's a nest of pigeons somewhere in here.

It's been a year since I rediscovered this place, and yet there's one room that I haven't ever stepped foot in. In fact, the last time I went into the room was around eight years ago. It was where I turned my back on everything I had ever known, where I took up the life that led to me being the way I am. It was Stuart and Jojo's bedroom. It's also the room where they died.

So, here I stand, on the threshold of the bedroom. Bright yellow police tape is still stuck over the doorframe, probably because the case was never solved, and the police don't like to spend too much time dwelling on their failures. I've contemplated about ripping the tape down and stepping in, but fear always gets the better of me, mainly because I know a room like this would undoubtedly trigger a premonition, and I'd rather not know what really happened instead of having the image of them dying stuck in my head.

"Pam…?"

Startled, I spun on my heel and raised my hand to my mouth. I felt a refreshing chill rise from my body and come out in the form of a freezing cloud of mist. Whoever shouted my name managed to dive into the hallway just as the cryokinetic energy hit the wall behind them, coating it in a thin layer of ice, which will no doubt cause even more damage to this wrecked shell.

Dean's head popped out from the edge of the hallway, and I relax, mainly because I'm a little amused at the look on his face. I think he may have wet himself. "Jumpy much?" He exclaimed, his eyes about as wide as the hole that's just formed in the iced wall. "For God's sake, how about you learn to use your eyes before your mouth?"

"Cranky much?" I said to him, imitating his tone from earlier. "What are you doing here anyway? I thought you were going out in the city with Trent all day so he could buy your love and affection by furnishing your room at Keith's. That was what was happening today, right?" Okay, so that one was a little below the belt, but what can I say? I'm scrappy!

I shouldn't probably say these things in front of Dean, just because I think Trent is a pathetic excuse for a human being who lacks a spine, that doesn't mean Dean should… well; no one said my little brother was the brightest star in the sky. "Hmm… Funny. Every time you say something like that, all I hear is a buzzing coming from your mouth." Oh, poor Dean. He tried. "I just finished up with him. I think he was going over to Mac's to get ready for that boring ass dinner party they're all having."

Oh, no. He's not getting out of it that easily. "Actually… I kinda told Jordann that you and I would be attending tonight…"

He then did something that completely threw me. Instead of shouting and protesting, like I thought he would, his face just… dropped. I swear, it's as if my statement made him age twenty years. His expression was just one of crashing disappointment, with only a hint of anger burning in his eyes. What the hell was going on with him? "Fine…" He told me, with a tone like I had just run over his puppy. "Is there a stupid dress code or anything?"

I frowned. He seemed so defeated that I felt guilty using him as a buffer tonight, but he wasn't exactly missing anything. At least not to my knowledge. "Nope. You can show up in jeans and a t-shirt if you want." It must be this damn apartment; it's bringing both of our moods down. "C'mon, let's get outta here. To be honest, I don't want to spend another second in this place..."

"Really?" He perked up a little, giving the hallway we were standing in a fond glance. "I always feel safe in here. Hey, do you remember sliding along this hallway every time we got new socks? You could slide on the marble all the way to end, I could get to about halfway, and Trent would usually fall flat on his ass…" Oh, wow. Maybe I didn't give Dean enough credit. Evoking memories of better days that involve Trent? That would have worked on most, but not me. "What do you think these walls would say if they could talk?"

Again, a nice try by little Walker, "Um… Oh, I know what they would say. 'Paint me!'." I started to walk towards him with a smirk on my face, linking my arm with his and dragging him towards the door. "C'mon, brother of mine, we've got the dinner party from Hell to attend tonight, and I have some pretty kick ass news to share…"

_I was right back then. I really didn't give Dean enough credit. With some gentle manipulation and extensive knowledge in my personality, he managed to totally avoid answering my initial question: why had he been there in the first place? In retrospect, I'm appalled that I didn't click to his trickery right then and there, but I'm glad things played out the way they did. Because, as I look ahead to later weeks in this journal, I smile when I remember how I finally found out why Dean had been there that day._

**XXX**

A little tip for getting through horrible dinner parties: in your glass of wine is a great place to hide.

It's been a roaring success so far, probably because there hasn't been any roaring. Hell, there's barely been any talking! Clinking cutlery and the odd compliment to Jordann about the food are really the only things that break the unbearable silence, that and Bridget's irritating habit of scraping her teeth on her fork as she pulls it out of her mouth. I think I even heard someone chewing at someone point. Poor Jordann, her face is enough to tell you that she too knows that this is a disaster. She can take comfort in the fact that it wasn't her idea though, and was just a miscarriage of ideas from her two loved up roommates. I can see she misses the snark I bring to the apartment trio.

And speaking of awkward, I had to watch Carmine practically sit on Keith's lap all the way during dinner, taking every bite of food with her pouty lips extruding from her mildly attractive face like a blowfish, and trust me, once I saw how she devoured the strawberries and cream for dessert, my analogy was justified ten times over within seconds. I'm trying to figure out when she transformed into such a vapid whore, because I know for a fact she wasn't always like this. Maybe she just did her make up to the degree of a drag queen's for tonight because she was threatened by me. I'll tell myself that, because if I realize that I was actually friends with a person like that, then I really _am_ going to need therapy.

On the flipside of the Lilly Savage look-a-like sitting across from me, I have to admit that Bridget looked rather beautiful this evening. She knew that smothering her face in fake tan and foundation isn't a good look, it seems, and has gone for a refreshingly natural look, with her fair hair tucked behind her left ear to reveal her solitary dangling earring that reaches her shoulder, which I'm sure was mine. Someone should tell Little Miss Homewrecker that she shouldn't wear jewelry she found behind the vanity, as she's reminded me to activate the Lost and Found spell I've put on all of my belongings.

I'm also starting to think that Bridget's boyfriend, Anthony, might have had a little something before coming to this party. He's probably a pretty handsome guy when he's not sweating, twitching, and mugging, but right now, he looks like he needs an ambulance. I swear, it's as if William Shatner is sitting at the table with us, and not a twenty-something college student.

"So…" Keith began, and immediately I retreat into my wine glass, knowing that his attempt to break the silence is going to crash and burn. "… Has anyone seen any good movies recently?" Oh, for the love of God. Why can't the chair I'm sitting on just swallow me?

"Trent and I went to go and see the forth Shrek movie a couple of days ago." I can't believe Mac took that bait, although anything that gets this conversation rolling is good enough for me. "It was okay, but I don't like the fact that Mike Myers left the cast in the third one. The new guy isn't as good if you ask me."

"Actually, I kinda liked him." Trent piped up, bringing another opinion to the table. Is this conversation starter actually working? "He brought a freshness to the whole film that the third one didn't have."

"Yeah, but now many adventures can a donkey, a princess, and an ogre have before it starts to get old?" Bridget piped up, showing a remarkable sign of actually having something in common with me. "I've been on a bit of an old movie binge recently. You just can't beat Old Hollywood."

Now we're talking about something I like. "I agree. I watched 'North By Northwest' a few nights ago. I also tried to get Dean into 'To Catch A Thief' but he just didn't take to it. Kids have no taste these days." I ignored the look of indignation I could see on Dean's face out of the corner of my eye as I carried on this surprisingly pleasant conversation while the others got engrossed in another topic at the other end of the table.

"Hmm… Do we have a Cary Grant fan on our hands?" She said to me with a smirk.

I shrugged in response, "What can I say? I just swoon when a guy's got a lovely voice." I looked the other way for just a second, and I noticed that Keith's been listening in. When he saw that I spotted him, he just smiled a little and went back to the conversation he was having with Trent. I've never told anyone this, but the slight raspy-ness in Keith's voice from smoking in his teenage years makes me a little weak at the knees.

"You know, my media class is having a little season of Cary Grant." She told me, an eager look on her face. Maybe she wants to dissolve the tension between us as much as I do. "We basically meet up on Wednesday nights, watch the movie, and discuss. You're welcome to come along if you want, it's open to everyone."

I smiled at her a little, "I might just do that…"

_You'll be pleased to know that I'm still good friends with Jordann, and after that night, I even became pretty close with Bridget. We don't see as much of each other as we'd like to, what with living in different parts of the country and always having something more pressing to do than to meet with friends. But reading this journal has reminded just how much I enjoyed their company. I think I'll give them a call when I get done cleaning the damn attic. Unfortunately, Mac is an entirely different story, for reasons that became all too clear a few months after this dinner party._

**XXX**

The three of us, Jordann, Mac, and myself, each stood on the balcony while the others were engrossed in some sort of game in the kitchen. I think Trent had pulled a box of 'Trivial Pursuit' out of his ass, because I knew for a fact that neither of my ex-roommates owned a board game of any kind. But still, it was getting people to talk and laugh, which was a lot more than I could say for the three of us on the balcony right now.

There had been a bit of tension between me and Mac recently. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure out how I felt about Trent, but apparently she's been dating him since around the time I disappeared. He helped her through the difficult time, or so I'm told. I just glad that it had been Jordann to tell me this, and not Mac, as I had snorted with laughter at the very thought of Trent helping anyone.

"I'm guessing the movies thing isn't going to make this tension go away, is it?" Jordann said nervously, standing in between us while we stood at opposite ends of the balcony. "Look, I don't want you two to fall out over a guy. They do enough damage to us without making us do damage to each other, and personally, I'm sick of being in the middle."

"I don't have a problem." I said. It was true, I'm not angry at Mac, as I realize that the way she's acting is just the way she is, and I can't change that. "I just don't think that Mac's seeing where I'm coming from."

I saw her move to face me out of the corner of my eye, while I kept looking down at the street below. "And you don't see where _I'm_ coming from." There's a certain venom in her tone that makes me seriously want to reevaluate her as a person if she gets this vicious over a guy she's known for three months, whereas I've known him for fifteen years. "Why can't you just leave the past where it belongs, Pam? I mean, he's here now, trying to make amends. Why won't you let him?"

"Because it's not as easy for me to let go things as it is for you, it seems." I spat back, probably showing a little too much of my true feelings. This was confirmed when I see Jordann cringe at what was coming.

"And what is _that_ supposed to mean?"

Alright, if she really wants go, we'll go. "How long have you known Trent? Three or four months? Well, you've known me for practically a year, and yet you're siding with him, completely dropping me in the process. And honestly? I think it'll lead to nothing but heartbreak, because how long will it be before you turn on Jordann too? Then, when it all falls apart, you'll have no one to lean on because you've alienated everyone."

"I didn't turn on you, Pam, so don't even try to divide this into two sides. You're the one who is being completely unreasonable with this. Hell, even Dean has accepted Trent, and he's gone through the same stuff you have, so what is your problem?" Her resolve flickered for a moment, clearly thinking if she should say what she wanted to say, of if she even had the courage to, "They're not even your real brothers… so why should take all this so personally?"

Okay, so it wasn't courage that made her that, it was sheer stupidity. It took all my self control to not blow up the wine glass in my hand, and to not throw its contents on the ignorant shrew that's supposed to be my friend. "Line. Crossed." I said in the most acidic tone I could muster, glaring heatedly at her.

Seeing that lingering in that spot would ensure her death, Mac moved inside swiftly. She's lucky I didn't throw her off the balcony with my powers for what she said. "Look, she's just being snotty right now." I wish Jordann wouldn't try and keep things together by trying to justify Mac's behaviour. "She just needs some time."

"What she needs is to get that lobotomy reversed." I said back. I've had enough of this crap. They can all stay here and bask in the sun that's shining out of Trent's ass for all I care, because right now I'm feeling like I'm the only one that can see the truth. I can see in Jordann's eyes that, to an extent, she agrees with Mac that I'm taking this too personally, but neither of them know what I went through. Dean doesn't even know what I went through. "I'm leaving. I'll get my own cab." At that moment in time, the thought of seeing any of these people within the next millennia made me want to vomit.

_Coming back after those three months to find that everything had changed was extremely hard to deal with. I came back, having lost a chunk of my life, to find that I didn't have a home, I didn't have a boyfriend, and the only thing I did have was a chivalrous gargoyle. And then, just when I thought I was adjusting to this new way of life, it seemed I lost my friends, and my little brother. To this day, I still hold a grudge against Trent, and I don't think that's something that will ever go away._

**XXX**

I stood at the bottom of the steps of my old apartment building. This area was pretty isolated from the rest of the city, so not many cabs would drive around here. I had had to call one out; it was now just the waiting that was irritating me, as I didn't want to stay here for another second. I wasn't even sure if I wanted to go back to Keith's. Nowhere felt like home right now, apart from the Manor, which was already full as it was.

I wrapped my arms around myself, bouncing up and down on the spot a little to keep warm. "Damn cabs…" I stepped out into the middle of the street, looking both ways to see if I could see the familiar yellow car coming towards me. Nothing. With a sigh, I turned to the right once again out of sheer hope, but I got a fright instead of seeing what I was after.

A man, I assumed, standing in the middle of the street like I was, only he quite a few feet away. A black cloak covered him from head to toe, and after realizing he hadn't been there a few seconds ago, my shoulders drooped from their tense position as I realized it was just a demon. "Look, I have had one horrendous evening, so if you really want to die at the hands of an enraged witch, then you've got your wish." I made the appropriate gesture, frowning darkly as I waited for my power to take effect and blow him up. The explosion never came. Instead, a pale green glow began to shine in the centre of his chest. He was wearing a protection amulet.

I hate the ones that put up a fight.

Without any warning, he suddenly flipped into the air, doing any impressive spins as he flew, his cloak billowing around him, but never showing his face. I caught a gleam in his hand as he descended upon me, presumably a weapon, and I crouched, rolling forward and out of harms way just as he landed at my previous spot. "Bastard!" I spat, throwing my leg out and hitting him in the back, causing the demon to stumble to the ground.

I strode towards him, planning on yanking the amulet off his neck and vanquishing him. I wasn't prepared for what actually happened though. He turned around, still on the ground, and raised a hand in my direction while his amulet shone with the same green light. Before I knew it, an explosion was going off against me, throwing me back a few feet and making me land roughly on the street. The amulet must protect him from a witch's powers, and grant them to him too.

I hit my head, so what happened next was a total blur. I pushed fruitlessly on the ground to try and get back up, before a mass of black blanketed the light from the streetlamp above me. I saw the same glimmer of a blade within the black mass, before there was a blinding pain across my face. I let out an agonizing scream, - because my God, it fucking hurt! - And fell unconscious almost instantly.

_It turned out that I had actually been attacked by a witch hunter. And if it hadn't been for Keith superspeeding down to the street when he heard my scream from the balcony, he probably would have finished me off. I was in hospital for a week after that. Apparently, I had been extremely lucky, as if the blade had gone a few millimeters deeper, I would have died. You're probably wondering why Leo didn't heal me, and answer is that he couldn't. After some research, Piper discovered that if a witch is injured by a weapon which has been blessed by a witch hunter, the injury cannot be healed magically. And it was that fact that made the witch hunter my most terrifying foe to date._

**XXX**

**April 24th, 2024**

I closed over the journal, smiling a little. The writer in me couldn't help ending things on a dramatic note, even though it was at the start of the journal. It was now complete, so I thought it would be best to put it back where I had found it, along with my old writing pen, which barely had any ink left in it after having twelve years to dry up in an old box in the attic. And speaking of the attic… "Oh, who am I kidding? Let the object of objection, become but a dream, as I cause the seen, to be unseen…"

I was crazy to think that I could actually clean this squalor up, so I watch with a little too much glee as the spell taps into my advanced telekinetic powers and sends everything flying back to its original place. It probably does a better job than what I could have done doing it the normal way, so everyone wins this way. Every box is stacked on the other into a neat corner, garbage and rubbish that I had collected in the preliminary sweep all get vaporized, and the it looks like the many rugs on the floor also got a clean. I'm gonna say it: even at thirty three, I still rock.

There's one thing that hasn't changed though. I smile fondly at the Book of Shadows as it lies on its altar, bathed in the afternoon light. The midnight blue cover is covered in a few scratches, and has worn away a little bit, but the silver triquetra still shines proudly and as brightly as the day the book was first reborn. I run my hands over the rough cover, still feeling that rush of magic that I felt the very first time I felt it. It's even more intense, now that I'm the eldest Charmed One.

"Oh, wow!" I look up, and shoot an irritated glare at Connor as he walks into the attic, having to duck a little to get through the door due to his tall well-built frame. "Maybe we should leave you to do the cleaning up by yourself more often!"

"Unlikely!" I boom back at him, shaking my head and striding towards him with a frown. I find it hilarious that I seem to intimidate him, even though he towers above me and even though I can't see his eyes through that mop he calls hair. "The next time you pull a runner like that, I'll get the twins, and then you'll have the Power of Three on your ass. And that goes for Wyatt too!"

"I'll be sure to tell him. Oh, and by the way…" He pointed towards the door, "Peyton told me she needs your help in the nursery. Apparently, she tried to change Andrea's diaper in an attempt to be helpful, and instead she's made a bit of a mess."

"Ew." I cringed a little, rolling my eyes, "Alright then, I'll go help." I headed towards the attic door, merrily hopping down the stairs, "Why don't you go and make yourself useful and go warn Wyatt of my threat." I shouted back up to the attic, a smirk spreading across her face. "Go and put the fear of Pam in him!"

**XXX**

_Okay, I know I kinda blindsided you all with that Charmed One and Power of Three stuff in that last scene, but it all makes sense in the end. I promise!_


	27. The Killer In Me, Part I

_Okay guys, seriously. What is with the lack of reviews? TCTB is on 14 favourite lists and 8 people have signed up for story alerts for it. Oh, and 39 freaking people have me on their author alert list, so I ask again: what is going on? Please, please review if you read. I want this story to end on high, both in popularity and writing (The latter will be taken of on my end, obviously.). If I don't start to see that more people are actually appreciating the hard work I put into this story, then I'll have to hold the next chapter as ransom (And since the next chapter is the conclusion of a two parter, I'm hoping this threat ill be more effective.). I don't want to become one of those writers, but this is a hard school year for me, and to be honest, it would be easier for me to just leave this story. I'm only sticking around because of the people that do review, and the fact that I want to see this through to the end and give it the finale it deserves. _

_Apologies again. I really hate to do this.  
_

_Okay, rant over. Please review!_

**The Killer In Me Part 1**

Piper rolled her eyes, quickening her step a little so she could catch up to Phoebe and snatch the high powered flashlight from her shaking hands, flicking the switch and diffusing the bright beam of light that had been shining from it a second ago. "Okay, Pheebs, we may want to find this werewolf, but we don't want to attract it to us with floodlights either!" She opened up a small compartment on the side of the tool, tipping the batteries out and inspecting them. "What the hell did you power this thing with, a nuclear isotope?"

"Funny." The middle Charmed One snapped back, snatching her flashlight back from her elder sister and sliding it into her jacket pocket, resuming their walk through the dark forest of Golden Gate Park, Phoebe's hazel eyes wide and darting around her line of vision. "I'm surprised the book didn't have much on werewolves. I mean, with all the legends that go around about them, how are we supposed to do how to handle it?"

"Well, we have the stun potion laced with powdered silver for a little extra kick when we find it." Piper replied, tightening her lips at the thought of the jewelry she had to blow up to get the powdered silver. "I think we're better just to try and deal with it as things unfold. That's how things usually go when we're up against the unknown." Her brow creased when Phoebe seemed to tense up for no apparent reason. "What's got you all jumpy? Is Brennan standing behind you blasting sparks on your ass?"

"No, and FYI, that can actually feel pretty _damn_ good when it's the correct voltage…" She replied, followed by a quiet giggle to herself as her cheeks began to redden.

Piper stopped in her tracks, her face twisting into one of extreme revulsion when she put her sister's statement together with her giggling, "Aw… _Ew_!" She smacked a hand over her eyes, as if she was fruitlessly trying to block out a mental picture. "Alright, putting your S&M antics aside, why don't you answer my first question?" The eldest Halliwell sibling's body involuntarily shuddered as she tried to shake off the memory of what she had just learned.

"Because thirteen years ago, Prue and I were walking through this very clearing. I had a flare gun in my hand and was trying to hunt you down. Or have you just forgotten all about the wendigo?" Phoebe frowned a little, turning to her big sister as they went down a small dip in the ground. "Hey, just how much do you remember of that anyway?"

"I remember standing in the middle of a forest naked. That's about it." Piper replied with a hint of disgust in her voice, still remembering bolting to hide behind a tree when she realized her unclothed state. "And you don't need to be worried. This isn't like thirteen years ago; we've picked up a helluva lot of riff raff over years, four of said riff raff, I might add, are somewhere in this forest, helping us."

"Two of said riff raff, actually." Phoebe argued, correcting Piper, "I would hardly count Paige and Pam as riff raff. I mean, they are family."

"You know what I mean. I'm just saying we've come a long-,"

"Pam! Watch out!"

Piper and Phoebe both froze at Annabelle's shout as it echoed through the forest. The scream was followed by a loud yelp, and the sound of distant snarling. A bright flash of light suddenly ignited the forest for a brief second, before a beacon of crimson energy shot up from the canopy of the forest, exploding in the sky into thousands of blood red sparks. It had been the flare potion designed by Paige so that they could alert each other in the woods.

Just before the two eldest Charmed Ones could run off that direction, however, there was another bright flash behind them. They turned around and watched as a large sphere of aquamarine light streaked into the sky, bursting into a flurry of light blue sparks that quickly dissipated. Paige and Emma's flare potion had been designed to give off a blue light, while Pamela and Annabelle's had been designed to give off red light. _Both_ groups now needed help?

"What the hell…?" Piper breathed, looking up at where the blue energy had exploded.

"You go that way…" Phoebe said; pointing in the direction Paige and Emma's distress beacon had come from, "… I'll go this way." She jerked her thumb over her shoulder, before the two of them split up to investigate the emergencies.

* * *

Annabelle ran towards the scene. She had only taken her eyes off Pamela for one second, and in that time the werewolf had managed to catch the young witch off guard and send her to the ground, currently snarling and snapping over her as she struggled to get it off of her. With a quick flick of the wrist, an energy ball sailed from the mercenary's hand, connecting with the beast's jaw and throwing him from his pinned down victim, landing with an undignified thud into a pile of damp leaves.

Pamela brought herself into a sitting position, sneering at the holes in her coat sleeve where the creature's teeth had pierced her clothing and skin. She cast her eyes to the night sky, suddenly fearful that this bite would make her transform into a werewolf. But as it stood, she was sitting in a pool of light created by the first full moon night of the month, and she was perfectly fine. It looked like the myth about a werewolf bite turning you into a beast yourself wasn't true.

"Are you alright?" Annabelle asked; taking the witch's hand and helping her to her feet just as the werewolf got up into a crouched position, ready to attempt another attack.

"Yeah, I'm fine." She glared at her enemy, who was currently growling lowly at her, before rolling her eyes as she raised a hand. "Son of a bitch!" She spat, gesturing at the heavy looking tree branch which was above the werewolf's head, and blasting its base, causing it to come down right on the creature's head. It crumpled to the forest floor with a pitiful yelp, becoming unconscious underneath the tree branch.

There was a rustling in the bushes as Phoebe bolted onto the scene, a psionic blast shining above her eyes as if she was ready to attack any enemy. Once she spotted that that werewolf had been incapacitated, the mental energy diffused and she walked calmly towards the duo. "Is everybody okay?" In the limited light, she couldn't see the blood seeping from her niece's arm, but she could see it running down her face. "Um… sweetie, you've got a little…" She pointed to where she saw the blood, using her own face as an example.

Following her aunt's direction, Pamela raised her finger to her face to find that it landed in a small stream of blood that was dribbling from underneath her fragile stitches. "Aw, damnit! That's the third time this week!" She resisted the urge to let her anger get the better of her, as that would make the already constant, throbbing pain on her face to get even worse.

"It's okay. It doesn't look so bad this time." Phoebe said, attempting to comfort her as she knew that this permanent scar was an extremely sensitive subject. "You've probably only burst one or two stitches. We'll get Brennan to fix you up." She hesitated, deciding whether or not to send Pamela to her husband right at this moment. "Actually, could you…?"

"Take her to Brennan? Sure." Annabelle replied, both of the older women ignoring the angry expression on Pamela's face. "What do you want me to do with him?"

"Um… Piper set up a crystal cage in the attic before we left. Dump him in there and we'll deal with him when he turns back into a human at sunrise."

"Alright." The blonde wrapped her hand around the forearm of the witch standing next to her and began to gently drag her towards the downed creature. She could feel Pamela trying to resist her pull, but she knew from experience that it was best to stay out of the action as much as possible when you had suffered an injury as severe as hers. Bending down, she lay her hand in the thick, matted, black fur of the werewolf, and burst into a cloud of particles that flew towards the sky.

* * *

"Emma!" Paige cried, as the redhead was sent flying into the thick trunk of a tree after receiving a powerful blow to the face from the werewolf's claw. Her head collided hard with the strong pillar of nature, sending her to the leafy ground with a thump. Going as fast as her heeled boots would carry her; the witchlighter ran over to her friend and applied her healing touch to Emma's head.

Piper chose this moment in time to burst through the hedges, quickly assessing the situation, "Oh my God…" She knelt down beside the two women, watching as the gash on Emma's head vanished under the light from Paige's hands. The eldest Halliwell's eyes widened as the creature bounded towards them, leaping up at the last second so he could come down on them. She wasn't about to let that happen. With a quick gesture, the demonic beast had been frozen in midair, allowing them to get Emma out of harm's way as she woke up.

"What are we gonna do with him?" Emma asked; her hair askew from the speed in which she had traveled from being hit by the creature. "Uh, Piper, the freeze is starting to ware off…" She warned, watching as the werewolf's moves began to slowly resume in midair as he his pounce entered its final stage.

"Uh… Oh, here's an idea." Piper's face lit up at her plan, before she raised a hand at the werewolf and broke the freeze with a large explosion to his back. He flew to the ground, rolling a few times in the dirt before quickly recovering with an athletic flip back into his feet. Unbeknownst to the three women, this werewolf was a lot stronger than the one the others had faced.

It advanced slowly upon the three of them, sleuthing towards them and almost turning invisible in the darkness of night, its amber eyes being the thing that gave away its position. Piper put her arms out and spread them over the breath of the younger women behind her, shielding them. She was surprised when she saw a vial suddenly fly over her shoulder and crash into the beast's skull. It let out a primal roar as whatever the potion had been, began to smoke on his snout, before leaping into the bushes and retreating with a whine.

"What the hell was _that_?" She shrieked, asking her youngest sibling with a wide eyed glance.

"It was a stun potion of the highest power. It's actually kinda worrying that it didn't knock him out." She explained, walking over to the last spot the werewolf had stood before jumping into the darkness, and inspecting the many dead leaves that littered the ground. "The glass from the vial cut his head, so…" She smirked as she picked up a small shard of glass, holding it up to the moonlight and seeing that it had a drop of crimson liquid on the sharp tip.

"Gotcha…"

* * *

Emma turned her head away as she laid the blanket over the boy's naked frame. He looked to be about ten of eleven, with thick, messy brown hair, probably put into that state from the transformation and the lunacy that came with it. "We'll give him some of Wyatt's clothes when he wakes up." She said, standing up and turning towards Paige and Phoebe, who were standing at the Book of Shadows. "Well, it certainly explains how Pam and Annabelle's werewolf was so easy to subdue. They got a cub."

"Yeah, and even then he got away with a chunk of Pam's arm." Paige replied with a snort, having healed her niece's arm before she went downstairs into the living room to get her stitches redone by Brennan. "Good thing that doesn't seem to be the trigger for transformation, although I don't really know of any other way to become a werewolf besides the voluntary ways."

Phoebe looked up from the book at this, shaking her head in disgust. "It's hard to believe that there are humans out there who would actually _want_ to become massacring fiends three nights a month…" She suddenly closed the tome, leaning on the cover. "I can't believe there's hardly anything in this book on werewolves. I mean; three centuries worth of witches and none of them have ever come across a werewolf?"

"Well, judging from how things went down last night, I'm guessing not many people survive an encounter with a werewolf to give info about them, even the most powerful of witches. Hell, it took three of us to just force it into a retreat!" Emma pointed, "That, and, they're pretty highly publicized creatures. Myth and fact have probably got all jumbled up over the years."

It was at this moment a swirl of buzzing particles coalesced in the attic, quickly coming together and forming Piper and Annabelle. Both witches looked as if they hadn't had any sleep for days, as they had spent all night scrying for the werewolf with his blood, only for it to move at the speed of light from its location and force them to start the process all over again. "Well, that was a waste of sleeping time." Annabelle said with a hint of venom as she beamed an extremely forced smile around the people in the room.

"No luck I take it?"

"Not even a maimed corpse or two." Piper said, putting the scrying tools down on the table next to her and slowly walking to the book, her bones aching from a night of running around wildly and using her powers. "Has Leo come back from the Elders with any info yet?"

"Nope. I wonder what always takes him so long. Maybe the Elders have some sort of waiting list for an audience and they haven't called his number yet." Phoebe commented, trying to make a joke to lighten the mood of the room. "Oh, forget what I just said." She said, as orbs funneled through the ceiling to form her brother in law, "Did you find anything out?"

"Um… not much." Leo said with apologetic face. "Werewolves are pretty rare creatures at the best of times, so the fact that you guys found two is just-,"

"Perfectly believable considering it's us." Piper cut him off, finishing the sentence herself.

"They did say that werewolves aren't inherently evil though. Their human form could be the kindest person on the planet, but when the full moon rises, werewolves are all pretty much the same… And that wasn't the only thing I asked about…" He looked up at Piper, who returned his statement with a puzzled frown, "They offered a solution to the problem we've been having."

"Problem? What pr… Oh." She stopped herself, her head drooping down a little at the mention of the divide that had been put between them since she had told him what she had done all those years ago.

"Yeah… problem is, it would mean we would be away all day, so you guys wouldn't have the Power of Three to help deal with…" Leo turned a little, glancing at the sleeping boy on the floor with a worried glance, "All this."

"It's okay." Phoebe replied softly, sensing that this was something that both Piper and Leo needed to do. "I don't think we'll need all three of us around for anything to do with this, and we have more than enough witches around here these days. So go, and if worst comes to worst, Paige and I will concentrate our power and summon you from wherever you are."

Piper let out a small groan. What she wanted to do was sleep and have a bath, not go off soul searching with her husband, which she knew was going to happen. Nevertheless, she knew it had to be done, so she shuffled over to her husband and leaned into his arms, letting him do the rest as he began to orb out. "Call if you need us!" She called as they vanished in a swirl of lights, disappearing from the attic.

A rather frantic knocking on the front door was heard, and Phoebe rolled her eyes. "I'll go check that out… make sure Bren and Pam don't go and scare whoever it is away…" She groaned as she turned on her heel and headed for the door, knowing that both of them were extremely tense at this moment in time.

Emma gazed at the peaceful boy in wonder, shaking her head in disbelieve, "It's hard to imagine that such a senseless and vicious creature can come from a person so… innocent and gentle." She turned to the two women she was left with in the attic, "I mean, I sense absolutely no malice from him. It's incredible. The boy's clay to be molded!"

"Yeah, he's pretty cute when he's not trying to tear Pam's throat out…" Annabelle commented, her brow creasing in confusion when Paige suddenly picked up the scrying tools Piper had left on the table. "What are you doing?"

"Scrying for the werewolf. I mean, the sun's up, so he'll be human now, easier to track." She began to swing the crystal over the map, holding the piece of bloodied glass between her fingers. "And, uh… speaking of Pam, how was she last night?"

"Driven." The blonde replied firmly, a look of anxiety spreading across her face. "It's like she's trying to prove to herself that she can still do this kinda thing, but in reality, she can't. Not until that scar has healed anyway. She needs to stay out of the demonic spotlight, or she'll get herself killed, maybe even you guys."

The crystal had dropped onto the map as she was talking. Paige, having looked up to converse, took a while to register that it had just landed, but the moment she saw the location of the amethyst, she knew where the creature was. "He's here!"

The three of them immediately bolted to the stairs, running down the flight that took them to the first floor and heading towards the ground floor, Paige raising her hands into an attacking position to prepare for whatever was downstairs. Their fears were quashed, however, when they reached the main stairway to see Brennan and Phoebe trying to help an injured man from the floor while Pamela watched on in confusion.

Once he had reached his full height, the man seemed to be only a little shorter than Brennan, with thick brown hair that resembled a mop in its current state. It had hadn't been for the torn clothes, and the lack of cleanliness, he would have come ruggedly handsome. It also didn't help that he had a bloody gash in his forehead where his hairline started. "Paige, get down here!" Phoebe shouted, trying to help the barely conscious man into the living room. "We need some healing!"

Paige smiled meekly as she came down the stairs, feeling guilty as it was her potion vial that had caused such a vicious and no doubt painful injury. "Well… I told you he'd be easier to track."

* * *

"Okay, Leo…" Piper began, taking a few cautious steps away from her husband as they appeared in a column of orbs. She looked around the room, seeing that the dirty cobbled ground had various herbs scattered on it, with some sort of altar in the centre covered in artifacts that Piper didn't recognize. "… When we orb out, I do usually expect to end up in the weirdest of places, but a musty old shed? What gives?"

"You're experiencing what few people get to see." He replied cryptically, before going on to elaborate. "The Elders thought that, to better understand your actions in the present, it would be good for you to see your actions in the past. Right now…" He looked around the dark shed, a humble expression on his face, "… We're in one of your earliest past lives."

Piper turned away from him to get a better look at her surroundings, seeing nothing that would indicate the era. "So… what year are we in?"

"Around the mid-sixteenth century." He smiled bashfully at her surprised look, "Hey, look, even I don't have all the answers. I couldn't tell the exact date, even magical records get old and wither away at times, and since it has been around three and half centuries…"

"Alright! I get it!"

At this moment, the door to the shed burst open with a loud bang and creaking noise from not being used in so long. Piper got a shock as she watched her past life walk in; clad in a large dress that looked similar to the one Melinda Warren would wear when they summoned her. What was even more surprising is who she came in with. Wearing the same type of dress, it seemed Paige's past life was accompanying Piper's, and was now looking around the shed with the same expression the real Piper had been wearing moments ago.

"Catherine, have you taken leave of your senses? We cannot punish the master with black magic! The town would have our heads if they found out. Send us to the gallows, they would!" Paige's past life cried, apparently lacking the fiery defiance that was such a big part of her present life.

"Calm yourself, Lila!" Piper's past life hissed, leading her into the shed and kneeling down at the altar, closing the door in between. "Listen to me. You are my one true friend in this world, and I thought I could share this with you. Please don't make me regret my decision." She saw the look on her friend's face, biting her lip. "These magicks is perfectly safe," She smirked a little, "Well, for us, at least."

"Catherine!"

"Lila, please." She took her hands, looking into her eyes so her point could be put across clearer. "We have served that tyrant for most of our days. We are meant to be his housekeepers, and yet he treats us like his whores. I still have the bruises from the last time he wished to have his way with me. Now, do you really want to continue to live in the fear of not knowing the next time he'll come into your room and ravish you? Please…" She pleaded again, smiling warmly.

"Very well…" Lila murmured back, allowing her friend to lead her to the altar where they knelt down at it, "What must we do to harness this…" She struggled with that to call what they were doing, as everything she had been taught in her life told her this was evil. "… Power?" She finished, pursing her lips.

"All you need to do is take my hands. I shall do the rest." Catherine said confidently, holding her hands out over the altar and offering her to her friend. Once they were connected, Piper's past life went extremely silent, trying to remember the words she had to chant for the desired effect, "Offendo malum intemptesta nox, signum suus fortuna una caecus lux lucis… Offendo malum in intemptesta nox, signum suus fortuna una caecus lux lucis… Offendo malum in intemptesta nox, signum suus fortuna una caecus lux lucis…" The two of them stood there in the dead of the night, waiting for something to happen. When everything seemed to stay the same, Catherine glared down at the altar with a fuming stare. "Why didn't it-?"

There was a shriek of surprise and fear outside, muffled by the enclosed space of the shed. The two maids shared a look that was a mixture of shock, terror, revulsion, and oddly enough, excitement. They rose to their feet and ran out of the shed; presumably to go and find out that the spell they cast really had worked after all.

"Catherine and Lila were found out a few days later when one of the gardeners discovered the altar and the magical artifacts hidden underneath a bale of hay." Leo informed Piper, who had watched the whole scene in wonder while at the same time, not properly taking it in. "They were drowned shortly after for practicing witchcraft. Actually, it's because of Catherine's use of magic in this life that made all the lives that came after her magical. It's the reason why you're a Charmed One."

Piper turned her head a little, not looking at him, but showing that she was trying to address him. "What am I supposed to be learning from all this exactly?" She asked, at a loss as to why she was being taken on this journey.

"You'll see." Leo said calmly, holding out his hand for her to take. Once again, his face was unreadable, but something told Piper that he knew full well what was going on, and he was choosing not to tell her. "Come on, we need to move on."

Glancing at the hand that was laid out in front of her, the eldest Charmed One carefully placed her palm in his hand, grasping it tightly out of fear of what was to come. The moment they made a strong connection, blue and white lights surrounded them, lifting them up to wherever their next destination may be.

* * *

"Thanks for the fresh clothes…" Darrin said sternly, looking down a little uncomfortably at the simple jeans, powder blue t-shirt, and checked red flannel shirt that had been given to him by Emma after Paige had healed his head wound. He sat down at the kitchen table, smiling a little at the plate of warm pancakes that were at his place, courtesy of Aidan. For people who he had almost killed the night before, they sure were hospitable. "Although you do know they're going to be torn to shreds when the moon rises."

Phoebe chuckled a little as she looked up from her store bought book on mythical creatures, giving Darrin a toothy grin. "Trust me, don't worry about it. My brother-in-law has _plenty_ more flannel where that came from!" She laid the book down, taking a quick glance at Aidan, who was at the sink, doing the dishes from the breakfast he had made. "Now, do you know anything about lifting the werewolf curse? Because that would really help this along right now."

"If I did, do you really think I'd be in this position?" Darrin retorted with a snap in his tone, instantly regretting it. "I'm sorry…" He said, "It's just that it's bad enough that this affects my son as well. He shouldn't have to grow up in fear of the full moon." He picked up the fork at the side of his plate and plunged it into the pancake in an aggressive manner. Around the time of the full moon, the werewolf in both him and son tended to be a little stronger in the daytime.

"Well, hopefully, all those worries will be gone by tonight." Phoebe said reassuringly, going back to her book with a new found vigour. "Emma and Paige are brainstorming right now to see if they can come up with a potion that can get rid of the werewolf in you, and if that doesn't work, then I should have a spell written in an hour… It's just pretty hard to piece together."

"You really think it's possible to make us normal?"

"That depends on what your definition on normal is." Phoebe replied, "But if you mean the werewolf thing, then I think we have a pretty good chance." She put her book down on the counter, looking up at Aidan, who had his back to her, "Hey, do you know anything about werewolves?"

The elemental turned around, shaking his hands over the sink to get rid of some of the moisture of them. "Not that much, I'm afraid. I mean, I know all the legends, but knowing that's true and what's not is a minefield these days. Maybe you should send Pam to the Atlantian library to see what she can find out. It'll keep her out of harm's way."

Phoebe nodded sadly, "True."

"Is that what _all_ of you think?"

The three of them jumped to see that Pamela was standing in the kitchen doorway, staring at her aunt and uncle like they had just stood on her feet. Her expression was masked slightly by the line of stitches running down her face, but it was clear that she was pissed, "First I have Brennan and Annabelle trying to stage an intervention in there, and now I find you two talking about me behind my back in here. If you have something to say, say it to my face."

"We weren't talking about you!" Phoebe protested, spinning around on the stool, "We were… just saying that maybe its best that you stay out of the demonic spotlight until your injury's healed. It would be best for you to-,"

"I think _I'm_ the person who decides what's best for me!" She said, grabbing her jacket from the back of the table chair and heading for the back garden, presumably to go out onto the street, muttering under her breath as she left with slamming the door. Phoebe moved to go after her, but Aidan shook his head, making her sit back down on her stool.

"I wouldn't. If I know Pam, and I do, then you're gonna need to give her some time to cool off until you can actually have a rational conversation with her." He warned, turning back to the sink and deliberately not adding that he had known Pamela for longer than Phoebe had.

"I think I'm gonna check on Josh…" Darrin said uncomfortably, standing up from the table and rolling up his last remaining pancake, stuffing it into his mouth.

"Alright." Aidan replied, "If he's woken up by now, tell me and whip something up." He got a muffled reply in response, as Darrin was still chewing through the spongy pancake in his mouth to talk properly. The sound of approaching footsteps made Aidan turn around, seeing Brennan and Annabelle enter the kitchen with looks of annoyance and disappointment on their faces. "Well done, both of two." He said sarcastically, drying his hands.

Phoebe whirled on him, glaring, "Aidan, don't even…"

"Well, if you're so in tune with her feelings, you go and talk to her." Brennan snapped back, sitting down on the stool that was next to his wife and looking at the cover of book with mild interest. "You know, Ally was once attacked by a werewolf when we were kids. They usually stay in rural areas like ours."

His wife's widened as she hit him rather forcefully on the arm with the book, "Why didn't you tell us this earlier?" She asked, trying to keep her voice down to she didn't attract Darrin's attention. "What happened?"

"Not much to tell." Brennan shrugged, "She was out picking what was left of the apples, since it was around halfway through the winter at the time. She let time get away from her, and she didn't realize the moon had risen, although in her defense, it was winter, so it got dark pretty quick."

"Get to the point!" Phoebe barked.

"Anyway, next thing we knew, she was staggering back to the house, looking like she had been mauled by a pack of wild dogs." He looked down at the counter, suddenly going silent as he, unbeknownst to everyone else, traced the outline of his family symbol into the wooden top with his finger. "That night, Mom went out and killed the sucker with a lightning bolt."

"Why?" Phoebe asked, not understanding why Julie had gone for such a vicious action.

"Probably because she was trying to protect her child." Annabelle cut in, laying her hands on the counter as she jumped into the conversation. "I don't know much about werewolves, but I do know one thing. If you kill a werewolf, all the people it infected will go back to normal." She locked eyes with Brennan. "Your mother probably did the whole area a favour. Very few werewolves can revert to being normal human beings, even in daylight or when the moon isn't full. A lot of them become murderers or cannibals, or worse! Darrin and Josh are pretty rare to have not gone completely…"

"… Feral?" Phoebe finished the blonde's sentence for her, earning a chuckle from Brennan at her choice of word.

"Exactly…"

"Alright, outta my way!" Paige demanded as she strode into the kitchen, an air of confidence around her as she pushed past various family members and started to get out a variety of different pots from the cupboard, before moving across to the pantry to retrieve a few jars filled with questionable substances. She beamed brightly as she set it all down on the counter, "I have a potion to brew!"

* * *

"Okay… so now we are we?"

It was an improvement from their previous dwelling, but Piper still didn't like where they had orbed into. It was an extremely busy bar, with at least five or fix people to each of the many tables, and an unbelievable amount of patrons crowded around the counter as they either engaged in conversations, got far too drunk, flirted ineffectively with the bar mistress, or all three at the same time. The dark lighting and the haze of cigar smoke that wafted around the ceiling discolouring the paint didn't help to add to Piper's liking of the place.

"Eighteen sixty four, Chicago." Leo replied in a matter of fact tone, starting to look around for his wife's past life. He had been briefed on each past life by the Elders, and this was the one he was dreading the most. "Look…" He said, pointing out someone who was sitting at the bar and making Piper's jaw drop.

Phoebe's past life sat at the far end of the bar, smoking a cigarette from her cigarette holder. When it wasn't in her mouth, she balanced her elbow on the counter and held the instrument in a sophisticated manner, blowing smoke rings out into the air. Her make up was done so heavily, that Piper had had trouble immediately recognizing her through the amount of eye shadow that made her eyes look like gaping holes in her face. A sleek satin dress stopped around halfway down her thighs, showing off the rest of her crossed legs to be clad in fishnet stockings. Just like present day Phoebe, this Phoebe stood out from the crowd, but not in the best of ways.

The door opened, letting in the chilling Chicago wind as Piper's past life walked in. As a contrast to Phoebe's, her dress went a little lower down her legs and was a flattering shade of lilac. Her make up was far more subtle, and the only thing that really made her stand out was the extravagant feather scarf that coiled around her neck. Piper had to smile at this, as these two past lives seemed to represent the differences her and present Phoebe had had when they were younger.

"You're late, Madeline." Phoebe's past life droned, taking a drag from her cigarette and surveying the woman as she sat down next to her with an icy stare.

"Sorry." Madeline replied, sitting down on the barstool with a satisfied smile on her face, "But like you always say." To Piper's shock, her past life suddenly threw a hand into her cleavage, bringing out a wad of cash and slamming it down on the counter, a smirk of triumph spreading across her face. "The customer always comes first."

"Good job…" Phoebe's past life said with a hint of amusement laced in her tone, goosebumps rising on her legs as the door opened yet again. Whoever had come in caught the woman's attention, and she immediately locked eyes with Madeline once more. "And speaking of jobs, I think we may have just secured our next ones." She nodded towards the door, making both Pipers turn around to see who she was talking about.

Leo and Brennan's past lives, both dressed in suave tuxes, entered the bar. The two of them were deep in conversation, presumably having just come from a play a few blocks over. Their hair was slicked back to match the style of the time, and apart from a slight increase in facial hair, they looked the same as their present lives.

"Hey, gents." Phoebe's past life barked to the two men who had just entered the bar. She caught their attention and stretched her right leg out to its full length in a seductive manner, following it with a wink. "Fancy on doubling your pleasure this evening?" She said as they walked over to them, standing up and running a hand over Leo's face, before trailing it down his chest.

"Oh my God…" Piper breathed, looking at this situation in disgust and embarrassment.

"Oh, it gets worse…" Leo warned as his face reddened, deciding to just turn away from the event altogether.

Past Piper smirked at her friend, clearly used to this type of behaviour when it came to reeling in their marks. She preferred to just let it happen on its own, and it did. After a few seconds of watching the other two get rather intimate, Brennan looked Piper's past life up and down before moving towards her and slinking an arm around her waist, gently pushing her off the stool and onto her feet. "Something tells me you don't come cheap." He said with a smirk, squeezing her rear.

"Nothing good in life ever does." She said with an equally provocative tone.

"Madeline," Phoebe's past life sang, breaking the close body contact with Leo's for a brief moment to address her colleague. "If you want, I can take both of them. I know how you hate having two jobs in one day…" Piper had been resisting the urge to think such things about her sister's previous life, but she could hold back her opinion from herself for no longer. Phoebe's past life was a complete and utter whore.

Madeline smiled back. It wasn't a smile of amusement, but rather a smile of triumph over her competitor, "It's perfectly alright, Lisa. I think I can manage." She turned back to Brennan's past life, grabbing the lapels of his jacket and pulling him down so his face was a hair's breadth away from hers. "I have a room upstairs. My guess is that you'd like to join me?" She smirked when the man's eyes dazzled with excitement.

"Certainly." He murmured back, before they broke contact completely as she, with an alluring smile, led him through the busy bar towards a flight of stairs just at the end of the counter that led up to the rentable rooms. Madeline had walked backwards through the crowd before reaching the steps and taking her client's hand, leading him up the stairs to where her room was with a girlish giggle.

As Piper had watched these events unfold, a wild array of emotions had gone through her head. Confusion, embarrassment, and as she continued to watch, nausea had been added to growing list of reactions. It was only now that as she watched her past self climb the stairs with her present brother-in-law to engage in unspeakable acts, that she was able to finally break her silence on the matter.

"I was a _hooker_?"

* * *

Emma smiled warmly to the little boy as she walked into the attic, carrying a plate of small sandwiches and a glass of milk. Josh had refused to leave the attic, apparently in fear of hurting someone, despite his father assuring him that he could do no harm in the daytime. "You know, you can come out of the crystal cage now. You can't hurt anyone when the sun is up." She said, halting at the perimeter of the cage when Josh let out a gasp of fear at the thought of her being close to him.

"I prefer to be alone on the days when this happens… At the time of the full moon, if my thoughts wander, I end up thinking about slashing people's throats out and other stuff that just makes me wanna puke," He said, surprising the empath with the enthusiasm in which he dug in to the chicken sandwich. "It's better if I stay away from people. That way, I don't end up think about ways to hurt them."

"Well, hopefully, you won't have to worry about that soon." The redhead replied, sitting down at the edge of the cage and sighing, "Me and my friend are working on a way to cure you as we speak… Well, as we speak, _she's_ doing the work, not me, but you know what I mean."

"What's it like?" Josh asked, looking up at her, his eyes shining with naivety, "Having friends, I mean… I've been a werewolf since I was six, so ever since I've kinda stayed away from people."

Emma's heart wept for this boy. She couldn't have imagined going through any part of her life without at least one person she could call a friend. Whether it had been Michelle from her high school days, the Mutant X team, or the Charmed Ones from her more recent years. Albeit, Michelle had become her enemy during an incident in another reality a few months ago. She had killed her in this house's own kitchen, and yet oddly enough, she had felt very little grief. "It's good." She finally answered, "There are times where things can go sour, but overall, it's good to have someone that you can trust with anything, be there for you… and of course, trust you through the harder of times."

"Sounds nice." Josh said with a hint of jealousy, looking at the remains of the sandwich he had slaughtered within the space of time Emma had been talking. He shook his head angrily, gritting his teeth. "I wish I never had been bitten… Sometimes I just wish that Dad had killed me outright instead of doing this to me… Making me just like him."

"Josh, don't say that." Emma replied softly, "Your Dad loves you very much, and I'm pretty sure that it was his love for you that held back the werewolf in him the night you were…" She suddenly trailed off, her look growing distant as she began to think. "Wait, you said you wished you had never been bitten. Does that mean that that was what turned you? A _bite_ from a werewolf?"

"Uh… Yeah."

"But you bit Pam last night and she didn't turn into one."

"That's because it was only the first night of the full moon." The boy explained, calmly taking a sip from his milk. "Someone's first ever werewolf transformation can only happen on the second of the three nights, because that's the only night where the moon is truly full. The nights on either side are almost full, but those still affect people who have been werewolves longer for some reason…"

Emma's mouth hung open a little at this revelation. With this new information, she knew what would happen when the moon rose tonight, when another werewolf would be added to the fold. "Oh my God…" She breathed, suddenly getting to her feet and walking briskly towards the attic steps. "Paige! _Paige!_"

* * *

Pamela sat crossed legged on the edge of the Golden Gate Bridge's main beam. She propped up her head in her hands, her dark hair billowing in the wind and occasionally blowing into her face, impairing her view of the busy traffic below for a brief second before the wind shifted direction and moved it from her eyes. The annoying thing was when a strand would get stuck in her open scar, and she would have to go the painful process of pulling it out of its bloody prison. But right now, she didn't really care. All that mattered right now was listening to faded noise of late afternoon traffic underneath her and enjoying the solidarity that came with it.

"It's a good place to think, isn't it?"

Annabelle slowly walked over to the seated young woman, joining her at the edge of the giant metal beam and sitting down herself, dangling her legs off the side of the bridge. She knew from experience that the last thing Pamela wanted would be to get her arm twisted into talking. The young witch was a lot like her in some respects, as they both tended to never let their true feelings show.

"It hurts." Pamela suddenly blurted out, making Annabelle look up from the bustling bridge below. "This is the longest that something has ever hurt. I mean, sure, I've felt pain worse than this, only for a few seconds though, as it's always vanished after a little bit of healing. But this…" She raised her hand up to her face, as if to touch it, before deciding against such an action in fear of breaking her fresh stitches. "It just sticks around as a constant reminder… It's practically unbearable." She turned her head, suddenly making eye contact with Annabelle before her gaze shot to the red metal below, "And… I think it's killing my powers…"

The blonde broker her silence at this proclamation, frowning a little, "What do you mean?"

"I mean exactly what I said." Pamela said firmly, "Ever since I got this cut, I've had to concentrate so hard for my powers to work, and even then they barely function before leaving me with a massive migraine." The young witch ran a hand through her hair, flinching when she accidentally wrenched a few strands out of her cut. "I'm losing it…"

"The tree branch last night was a fluke, wasn't it?" Annabelle questioned, taking in this new information and melding it with what she had witnessed the previous night. "You were really aiming for the werewolf when you went to blast, but you hit the tree branch instead and passed it off as your original intention… Am I right?"

She smiled weakly in return, "What can I say? I can think on my feet."

Annabelle sighed. She wasn't good at comforting other people. Or at least, she wasn't anymore. "Look, I wouldn't worry about losing your powers." She said, shaking her head to dispel the doubt. "You said it yourself, the scar is excruciating. Trying to find the concentration to use magic when you've got a near-fatal injury burning into your face must be a real strain, which is why everyone's been on your back to take it easy until it heals properly. That's when you go after the son of a bitch that was stupid enough to do it to you in the first place!"

Pamela grinned at her companion. It was a shame that the Annabelle they had known for a year hadn't been real, as if she had, Pamela felt that they probably would have gotten on extremely well. "Thanks."

A cloud of orbs culminated just behind them, depositing Paige into their company. The witchlighter stumbled a little, surprised by where her sensing abilities had landed her as she was almost knocked over by the wind. "Oh, thank God!" She breathed when she spotted her niece sitting in front of her. "We need to get you home and into a pentacle. Now."

"Why? What's wrong?"

"We found out how people turn into werewolves, and from the sounds of things, you have about…" Paige looked at her watch, quickly doing the math. "Four hours without fur left, so come on! Let's go."

"Wait, what the hell does-?"

"_Now!_"

* * *

Piper watched with horror as Madeline pinned Brennan's past life to the flimsy wall with telekinetic force that was flowing from her open palm. The Charmed One's past life had a sadistic smile on her face as she watched her victim's face turn purple from lack of oxygen, and his eyes bulge in sheer terror at what was happening. "There's a reason I find this job so easy…" She growled, waving around the large wad of bills that she had taken from him as a payment before performing this cruelty upon him. "There's also a reason no one finds out about my methods."

With a forceful swing of her arm, she sent the man flying across the room, through the thin glass that made up the window and onto the street below. Madeline heard a thud, followed by a woman's scream that probably belonged to someone who had had the misfortune to be walking by the building at the time. "Nice working with you…" She said with a smirk, before losing her playful attitude and turning serious.

She waved a hand in front of her face, instantly changing her appearance. Her classy and collected look was transformed when a bloody cut suddenly appeared on her lip, followed by a bruise to the cheek and an angry red graze on her forehead. Her dress had also been altered, with one of the straps suddenly becoming torn and letting the dress slip from her body a little. Madeline smiled at the reflection of her beaten appearance in a large broken shard of glass that still hung in the pane.

There was a sudden slew of feverish knocking at the door, and Madeline instantly knelt to the floor, lying down and pulling herself up into the fetal position, slowly beginning to weep. The door burst open, giving entry to Phoebe and Leo's past lives, who had clearly put on their clothes in a hurried manner after hearing the commotion. "Madeline! What in God's name happened?" She shrieked, kneeling down next to her putting a supportive arm around her.

Madeline attempted to speak through sobs, before managing to compose herself enough to form a sentence. "He asked me to do such unspeakable things!" She wept, "I refused, and he got violent. Next thing I knew, he was hitting me, and…"

"Why didn't you tell me I was a _demon_?" Piper suddenly spat heatedly to Leo, who had been watching the scene along with her. She refused to believe that she, a Charmed One, mother of two, married to an Elder, could have come from such an evil being. "I mean, if I was a demon in this life, how was I reborn? Demons don't have souls to reincarnate!"

"Maybe because the universe saw that redemption was possible in your next life." Leo replied calmly, holding out his hand. "Come on. We have one more time to visit before we deal with what you did in your present life. I think you'll like this one a lot more…"

He was right. As the orbs around them disappeared, Piper finally found herself standing in a familiar spot. She and Leo had appeared at the foot of the staircase that led up to the Manor's attic. A smile spread across her face, until she noticed that the chest of drawers opposite the stairway didn't have pictures of her children, but instead, pictures that usually inhabited a dusty box in the attic were out on display. Even more disconcerting was a faint sound of a party downstairs, accompanied by the sound of someone playing the piano.

"This is actually the era of the past life that haunted Phoebe eleven years ago." Leo informed her. "Back then, the Manor was a speakeasy. It was still part of your family of course and it was run by three cousins, each of them being the past lives of you, Phoebe, and…"

He didn't need to finish his sentence, as the answer was walking right past them. Prue's past life, clad in an a conservative mint green dress with her short red-brown hair tied back, made her way towards the bedroom which Piper and Leo occupied in the present. From knowledge gained when Phoebe had visited this life, Piper made the assumption that it was also the room where her past life and Gordon Johnson slept. Her suspicions were confirmed when they followed Prue into the room.

Piper's past life was sitting at the window of her bedroom, clad in a simple cream nightgown that went down to her ankles. She was staring blankly out into the street, apparently too lost in thought to even notice that her cousin had just entered the room. "A few people downstairs…" Prue began, "Have been asking whether or not you will be singing today." She said stonily.

Past Piper turned her head to the side a little to address her cousin, her eyes narrowed. "You expect me to sing to such merriment after the atrocity we committed yesterday?" She growled; her tone scathing and acidic, making Prue's past self physically flinch. "I'm surprised we even have customers today after what happened…"

"Sebastian took care of it with memory dust. We agreed that it would be in the best interest of the Greater Good… As was Phoebe's death." Prue said calmly, not even showing a hint of remorse for what she had done, yet her voice dripped with pity for her remaining cousin, who had always been far too passive for her own good.

"Sebastian?" Piper thought aloud, prompting Leo to explain.

"Their whitelighter." He replied, "He was actually Aidan's past life. I knew him for about ten years, before he was killed by a darklighter arrow to the heart in the fifties." The Elder looked down at the floor for a brief moment, silently remembering a friend that seemed so far away now. With his mortal and magical life combined, he was almost ninety years of age, so a person that he had known for a decade now felt like such a small chapter of his life.

"You can attempt to justify all you want, Prudence, but it doesn't change anything. We still killed a member of our family."

"We didn't have a choice…"

"There's always a choice!" Piper's past life shouted, rising to her feet and spinning around to face her elder cousin, her eyes burning with frustration and anger, although who it was directed at, she had no idea. "She was part of this family, Prudence, one of us! We could have talked with her, made her see sense, or even have used magic!"

"She made a choice with her own free will; we couldn't have fought that, even with magic!" Prue's past life argued back, seeming to be tired of having this argument with her cousin. "She was coming after our powers; she was coming after the book. What we did, we did in self defense. Don't you forget for one second who was first to attack yesterday, as it certainly wasn't either of us, Piper."

"Get out…" She bleated in response, sitting back down into her chair and going back to staring at the house across the street.

"Piper…"

"Get _out_!"

Piper and Leo flinched at the scream, and Prue's past life instantly retreated, shaking her head mournfully and heading towards the door. She stopped in the frame, looking at the back of the chair her cousin was sitting in, before plastering on a fake smile as she headed towards the stairs to entertain their customers once again. "They killed Phoebe, didn't they? I mean, past Phoebe." Piper corrected herself, a little shaken at the exchange she had witnessed.

"A few months later, both of the women couldn't stand to be around one another." Leo informed her mournfully. "Prue's past life left the Manor shortly after they had their final argument, vanishing off the radar… Your past life stayed in the Manor with her husband, and eventually, she gave birth to Penelope Johnson, your Grams." He looked sadly to the Piper sitting in the chair, staring out of the window. "This was the last life before you were reincarnated into what you are today."

Piper gulped, knowing well full what was coming next if that was true. "So does that mean…?"

"Yeah, let's go."

* * *

Pamela stood nervously in the centre of the pentacle, feeling slightly like a trapped animal. Right now, she could walk in and out of it with ease, but when the moon rose in a few moments, she would be trapped here until sundown, when she would wake up with no recollection of the night before, and would have ruined her clothes as a consequence. "Oh!" She suddenly gasped, putting her hands behind her head and undoing the clasp that kept a golden heart-shaped locket around her neck. "Keep that safe." She said, throwing it in Emma's direction. "So, how's that potion coming downstairs?"

"We need to let it simmer for an hour, adding pinches of silver every fifteen minutes. Paige is keeping an eye on it. We then we need to let it cool without the help of ice or anything. We don't want to taint it. But the problem isn't the potion, it's the fact that it needs to be administered orally while the person is in werewolf form." Emma replied, turning to Phoebe who was looking through the Book of Shadows. "Have you found anything?"

"Just your garden variety stun potions, but we've already seen that that does absolutely nothing against werewolves." Phoebe replied, turning another page. "I don't know what else we can do. I mean, they're immune to spells, so that rules them out, and we'd have to get close to knock them out since your mental blasts didn't work last night, which just isn't an option."

"We'll figure something out…" Emma said, turning back to Pamela, "The guys and Annabelle got the kids outta here, just in case anything goes wrong." She said quietly to the three people, trapped in their respective magical binding fields.

"If it's any consolation, it doesn't hurt when you transform." Darrin piped up, smiling apologetically at Pamela when she turned to face him, "The last thing you see is the light of the moon, then the next thing you know, you're waking up hours later naked." He looked past Pamela to smile at his son, "It's not that bad, right Josh?"

"I'm sorry…" The boy said meekly to the young witch, ignoring his father coldly. "For biting you, I mean."

"It's okay, kid. Worse things have happened to me." She said in a comforting tone, before her eyes flickered towards the window where pale moonlight was slowly spreading across the rooftops and making its way towards the Manor. "Okay then, I guess this it… Sorry in advance, you guys." She added meekly, before all of a sudden, all three of them suddenly became transfixed by the moonlight.

Pamela's eyes flickered to a glowing yellow that almost shone out of her skull. Her nails began to lengthen and mutate into vicious claws as thick black hair suddenly began to sprout from all points on her body. Her height also took a sudden leap, bursting her t-shirt instantly as she looked towards the ceiling, her face how twisting and curving into a dog-like façade before her jeans burst from her lower half, revealing powerful hind legs that looked even more dangerous than the arms. She stood there, nearly double her original height, baring her long teeth before howling proudly, despite the blood pouring from her face.

"I think it's safe to say she's burst her stitches again…" Emma whimpered, moving backwards and holding onto Phoebe's forearm out of fear of the three menacing creatures that now stood before them, each one looking more terrifying than the next.

What happened next was a shock to the system for both witches. Pamela crouched down, taking the same attacking position Darrin and Josh had taken in the forest the previous night, and instead of being thrown back to the floor by the power of the pentacle she was trapped in, she glided effortlessly through the air towards the two witches. Thankfully, Emma, in a sudden burst of primal panic, vanished in a swirl of rosy pink orbs, taking Phoebe with her and orbing them both to safety as Pamela skidded to a halt on the floor.

The two of them reappeared on the other side of the room, their eyes wide with terror. "Why the _hell_ didn't that pentacle work?" Phoebe shouted, her gaze transfixed on Pamela as her niece glared at them with her burning yellow eyes. "Uh… Emma, she looks like she coming around for second go."

"No, she isn't…" Emma replied, watching as Pamela's gaze shifted from them, and to the full moon that was shining brightly in the sky above the city. "Oh, crap! She's about to-,"

She was cut off by a loud crashing noise as Pamela bounded at the moon, shattering the window instantly as she jumped from the house and sending sharp shards of glass all over the attic floor and presumably the walkway outside that led up to the house. Emma and Phoebe rushed to the window, and were paralyzed with shock as they watched Pamela's head rear back and howl at the moon, before running off into the night and vanishing into the darkness…

**TO BE CONTINUED…**

* * *

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	28. The Killer In Me, Part II

**The Killer In Me Part 2**

"A gap…" Emma sighed, bending down at the edge of the pentacle and staring at the small space in the outer circle of the symbol. That was why it had failed. Paige hadn't properly drawn it. "Paige, there's a gap in the perimeter of the pentacle, that's why it didn't hold Pam. How did you miss it? You were supposed to check this after you finished drawing it!"

"I did! Twice!" Paige howled in response, her hand glowing against Phoebe's cheek as she healed a small cut that had been caused by a piece of flying glass. "Put it down to extreme sleep deprivation, or maybe Pam accidentally scuffed it off with her shoe when she walked into it." She brought her hand away as the skin brought itself back together again. "Besides, it's going to be fine. The guys and Annabelle will bring her back in one piece, then-,"

As she spoke, a buzzing noise began to grow louder than her voice. A whir of particles entered the room, followed by larger torrent of water that rose up from the floor, forming the three magical beings that had gone searching for Pamela. Aidan was currently holding Brennan up by slinging the mutant's left arm around his shoulders, as Brennan was barely standing.

"Oh my God!" Phoebe gasped, rushing to her husband and repressing her gag reflex at the three vicious slashes that had nearly taken off the right side of his face. Blood had run down his cheek, down the collar of his jacket and was currently trickling down his shirt. "Paige, a little healing please!" The middle Charmed One shrieked as she led her husband to the couch to sit him down.

"What the hell happened?" Emma asked the two that were still uninjured, while blocking out the growling and snarling of the werewolves that they still had trapped in their respective dark matter cages.

"Pam still has her powers in that form, that's what happened!" Annabelle snapped, still having a slight headache from the strong pulse of astral energy that Pamela had given off to repel the three of them from her. She had somehow managed to stay awake as she fired the blast, using the confusion to slash Brennan. "Yeah, we have one mean ice-breathing werewolf on our hands."

"Uh… Paige, when you're done here, can I talk to you for a second?" Aidan asked, his eyes shifting to the attic door and showing that he wanted this talk to happen in private. He widened his eyes, along with his smile, which made his wife even more intrigued about what he wanted.

"Sure, just a little more…" The witchlighter watched with a slight grimace as her eyes followed the trail of blood that was now crawling back up Brennan's face and into the three slashes, which were now beginning to repair themselves. "How did she even get close enough to do this anyway? I know we told you to watch your voltage, but if she's coming at you, do what you need to do to defend yourself."

He winced a little at the pain of his wound, which was slowly beginning to ebb away. "I didn't exactly have much time to react. She blasted us all in different directions. Next thing I knew, she's standing over me with her arm raised." He tilted his head back up once the cuts had vanished, giving Paige a small smile of thanks.

"Okay, landing." The witchlighter announced, pointing to the attic door and getting to her feet, heading out of the room with her husband in tow. They stopped at the small landing on the attic steps, Paige standing there with her hands on her hips as Aidan closed the door behind them. "Alright, what is it?"

"Um…" He hesitated, trying to find a way to tell her this without causing her anymore stress. "Well, you see, it's about how Brennan got attacked… I think he did actually try to ward Pam off with a lightning bolt, but he just couldn't." He waited for her to react, only getting a perplexed expression in return.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that I saw him look up at Pam as she stood over him, I saw him raise his hands as if he was trying to do something, and then…" The elemental shrugged, "Nothing. Not even a spark. After he was slashed, Annabelle clipped Pam in the backside with an energy ball and we got outta there so you could heal Brennan… You pretty much saw what happened after that."

"So, what are you saying?" Paige said in a scathing, her short temper getting the better of her, "Do you think that Brennan is magically impotent?" She rolled her eyes as she saw him visibly wince at her word choice. "What the hell is it with men and that word? Never mind…"

"No, I'm not saying that. I'm just saying that with all that he's gone through lately, I wouldn't be surprised if he's having a little trouble keeping a grip when it comes to controlling his powers." Aidan explained, "Witches get their powers from their emotions, right? So it's understandable that both are a little out of sync right now."

Paige sighed, shaking her hand and letting her arms fall to her sides, "Alright, fine… We should probably try to keep him out of the firing line, and we should definitely not tell Phoebe. I'm sure the last thing Brennan wants or needs is her psychoanalyzing this 'condition'." She used air quotes to emphasize her point, "Even though she would be doing it to help…"

"Okay, but since we're now losing a main source of firepower, I think we should call Piper and Leo back here. This is getting far too complicated, and you may end up needing the Power of Three..." He frowned a little when she scrunched her eyes shut and shook her head a little. "What's the matter?"

"Nothing." Paige said defiantly; throw her head back up from his drooping position and opening her eyes wide, as if to keep herself awake. "I'm just a little tired, that's all. Let's go and summon Piper."

* * *

Piper's heart skipped a beat in fright as they went from the deathly silence of the Manor, to the loud, thumping music of what seemed to be a party. The strobe lights made it hard to decipher the faces of everyone on the dance floor, as every time you caught a flicker of their features, there would be another flash and the person would have vanished deeper into the crowd. There was a sudden outbreak of playful screams, and Piper looked around just in time to a beer spurt like a geyser from a nearby keg and spray a crowd of dancing girls. She knew exactly where she was.

"Where are we?" Leo asked. It was odd. Her husband was speaking barely above a whisper, and yet, in this environment, where the base and loudness of the music was giving her a thumping headache, she could hear him perfectly.

The eldest Charmed One smirked a little at his question. It looked like it was his turn to be led, "This, my dear husband, is one of the many campus parties of the early nineties that happened at Berkeley University…" She stated in a droll tone, surveying their surroundings with an air of uneasiness. "After an extremely quiet and lonely high school life, let's just say that when college came around, I let my hair down a little." She reluctantly nodded her head to the right, cringing as Leo turned around to see where she had indicated. He could immediately see what had caused her embarrassment.

A younger, far more carefree Piper, was sitting atop the bar, her legs wrapped around the torso of a man that had his hands placed firmly on her hips as he slid her forward on the counter, bringing her closer to him. Leo could see his wife's younger counterpart smirk through the constant flashing of strobe lights as she draped her hair over the man's head, creating a curtain over both of their faces and covering them from the prying eyes of the other people that surrounded them. "I can't believe it." Leo gasped, feeling just as uncomfortable as he had been while watching Piper and Brennan's past lives make out with each other.

"Yeah, that's me. Loose, single, and ready to…" She trailed off as a familiar swirl of white lights encased both her and husband in a whirlwind of brightness. Piper's senses instantly went into overdrive with panic, until she heard the faint echoes of her sisters chanting through the cosmos to move her through time and space. "Damnit…" She growled, before both of them vanished completely.

* * *

"Pam's a _what_?"

Both Phoebe and Paige visibly cringed at Piper's shriek as they filled her in on the situation. Irritatingly enough to them, their eldest sister looked just as fresh as she had when Leo had taken her away that morning. Wherever they had been, there had to have been a difference in how time passed. "Okay, Piper, just calm down. We figured out a way to fix things." Phoebe said, trying to sooth her sibling. "There's a spell in the book that invokes-,"

"I don't get it." The eldest Charmed One jumped in again, apparently unaware that Phoebe had even tried to speak. "She was bitten last night and she didn't turn into a werewolf, so what the hell made tonight so different?"

"Long story, but we can actually end said long story with this spell. See, it invokes the essence of the goddess, Artemis, who was the goddess of wild animals. If we can summon her…" Phoebe trailed off as she saw her explanation fall on dear ears, curling her hands into fists with frustration as it seemed Piper refused to listen to them, preferring to pace back and forth in front of them. "Piper!"

"What?" She snapped.

"Are you even listening?"

"Yes! Goddesses, spells, essences… continue."

Phoebe bit her lip, keeping a lid on her temper towards Piper's attitude. "Anyway, if we can summon her essence, we can channel it to make her subdue those two…" She waved her arm in the general direction of Darrin and Josh, who were both clawing and scratching wildly at the magical force field which contained them. "… then we can give them the potion, and Pam will return to normal."

Emma gave the trio a bittersweet smile as she stood at another point of the room, preparing the ritual that would summon the essence of Artemis. Normally, she would have intervened by now, but something told her that any effort on her part to diffuse whatever had Piper so tightly wound would be fruitless. The tense happiness in her face flickered for a moment. Her effort being useless was starting to become a running theme in her life. When making the werewolf curing potion, Emma had hardly contributed. It had been Paige that had ultimately cracked the mystery and concocted the extremely complicated potion; she had had little to do with its creation. "The offering potion's ready." She announced, making all three witches turn around to face her.

"Oh, good." Paige replied, walking over to her with her sisters closely behind. "Alright, we'll send the others to go and find Pam while we do this. The last thing we need is for her to turn back into a human in a crowded area and exposing herself."

"But won't we need to give Pam the potion too?" Piper asked, looking into the copper potion pot and biting her lip. "Um… Emma, the book says that the potion is supposed to be a blood red. That's…" She glanced at the liquid in the cauldron again, cocking her head. "Pea green."

"Ah, crap…" Emma sighed, moving towards the book to see where she had gone wrong. It was just a simple ritual concoction! What was wrong with her?

"To answer your question, we don't need to give the potion to Pam. If we vanquish the werewolves inside those two…" Phoebe flicked her head in the direction of the caged beasts. "Then that, in turn, should turn Pam back to normal, since technically, we'll have killed the werewolf that caused the bite." She turned to Emma, who was currently cursing her own failure as she poured a crimson substance into the potion. "I take it you figured out what you did wrong?"

"Yeah, it just a stupid slip up." She shook her head, angry at herself. "We're summoning the goddess of wild animals, and I forget to add the blood of a wild animal, the one thing that would connect this potion to Artemis. How stupid am I?" She asked, jerking the jar over the cauldron to get all of the contents out.

"Well, it was probably just the passive vegetarian in you…" Phoebe smiled kindly, knowing deep down that she probably couldn't make this potion without some serious guidance from both Paige and the Book of Shadows, so she wasn't going to hold a small slip up like this against the fellow empath.

Paige looked up when she heard footsteps against the wooden floor, seeing that Leo, Aidan, Brennan and Annabelle had entered the room after checking on the children downstairs. "Perfect timing." She commented, placing a few of the remaining ritualistic items around the copper pot. "We're just about ready to cast the spell, so you guys should probably go and find Pam."

Aidan tapped Annabelle on the arm, "You wanna scry?" He offered.

"Sure." She replied, picking up the garnet scrying crystal, along with Pamela's locket, and entwining the two so she could spin them together. "You know, it's a good thing that you guys upgraded to a garnet." Annabelle said, her eyes following the crystal over the map. "With the amount of time you guys spend fighting demons and turning into them, you need a scrying crystal that's highly sensitive to magic." She frowned when the crystals didn't land somewhere after a few seconds. Instead, it was pulling her hand to go off the map.

"Here…" Piper chipped in, folding out a massive map on the table that she had acquired from one of the drawers in the dresser it completely masked the wooden top, "Statewide map. Go for it." She said, going back to watching the crystal swing. It dropped almost immediately, landing on a point that made both witches gasp in disbelieve, "Okay, how the hell did she make it all the way to the Sierra Nevada mountain range?"

"Werewolves are notoriously fast. In fact, that's why they're so deadly. They don't have overwhelming physical strength, but the fact that they can clear five miles in around four minutes is pretty damn dangerous…" She looked a little self-conscious when Piper stared at her with an awed expression. "I've dealt with the odd werewolf in the past."

"Okay then, let's go." Leo announced, zipping up his jacket a little. "We're going to need to pick up a tourist map of the area or something and use that to scry. The Sierra Nevada goes on for miles, so we're going to need to get more than a general area."

"So, we're going to have to break into a tourist office or something?" Brennan asked; his eyes dazzling with childish excitement as he rubbed his hands together with a grin. "Sounds like my kinda job!" He said enthusiastically, earning looks from all around the room, apart from Aidan and Paige, who had glanced at each other nervously.

"Um… Actually, it's probably better if you stay here and look after the kids or something…" Paige suggested quietly, pursing her lips and turning away from Phoebe when she spun around on her, frowning. "It's just that the others have transportation powers, so if Pam's running at them, they can just vanish instead of relying on their feet to get away."

"… You've almost been killed once already today." Aidan added, nodding his head slightly in agreement.

"Are you kidding me?" Brennan exclaimed, his brow creasing in anger as decided to direct this anger at Aidan. "I have a lot more firepower than you, so maybe _you_ should stay here and look after the kids." He said, raising his eyebrow challengingly.

Before Aidan could respond, Piper stepped in. "I actually agree with Paige. From what I hear, if Pam had cut you a little deeper, you wouldn't even be standing here right now, so you stay here. We've learnt from experience that gods can be tricky, so we need another witch to help Emma if something goes wrong."

Brennan scowled at the people who had shut down his outing, "Fine…" He grumbled, stuffing his hands into the back pockets of his jeans as he exited the attic, shaking his head angrily on the way as he disappeared down the steps.

"What was that all about?" Phoebe asked her youngest sister, who had been the one to originally oppose Brennan's leaving. "Tell me." She insisted when Paige remained silent, choosing to fidget with the ceremonial dagger that had been set next to the copper pot.

"You heard my reasons." Paige replied in a light and airy tone, walking around the table to take her place in where they would be standing for the ritual. She glanced across the room briefly, sharing a stare with Aidan as he left with Annabelle and Leo. Once all three of them had exited in their own magical way, she turned to her sisters, raising her eyebrows suggestively. "Shall we?"

* * *

Pamela let out a feral roar as she rolled over once again. The bear was currently winning their wrestling match thanks to a weight advantage. If she had been in her human form, a bear claw to the chest would have ripped right through her, but as a werewolf, it only succeeded in winding her mid-roar, turning it into a hushed whine. A few of her ribs had been broken, but like this, she felt invincible. As long as the moon was shining brightly in the sky, she could never lose against any opponent.

The large brown bear that was currently trying to tear her apart let out a loud growl, saliva dripping from its mouth and onto the creature below as it tried to protect its territory. It snapped its large teeth in retaliation to Pamela's gnashing, before it was thrown off in a sudden burst of energy from the werewolf.

Pamela pounced to her feet as the bear toppled to the ground. Her enemy didn't stay down for long though, as regained a four legged position quickly, before getting up on its hind legs to match her height. The two of them faced off for a few seconds, before Pamela suddenly opened her mouth and let out a deafening roar, unwittingly activating her cryokinetic abilities and releasing a high powered jet of frigid mist that engulfed the bear almost instantly, freezing the leaves on the ground around it, and leaving the bear perfectly preserved in a thick layer of ice.

Satisfied that the threat had been taken care of, Pamela turned her head towards the mountain, and began to pad quietly up the slope, moving with stealth. And she wasn't the only one.

She stopped dead in her tracks, her pointy ears twitching as she honed in on a sound. She could hear someone's laboured breathing, as if they had were suffering from exhaustion after having to run for so long. Turning her head and casting her amber eyes into the dark forest, she scanned the area, and almost immediately, due to her keen eyesight spotted a moving figure in the trees and let out a roar as she pounced towards them.

* * *

Piper struck a match against the rough side of the box, causing the flame to ignite at the end of the small piece of wood before she dropped it into the potion. She and her sisters flinched with fright when a plume of white flames erupted from the pot, creating a fire within the cauldron and bathing the sisters' faces in a warm orange glow as they began to chant the invoking spell together. "By fire's light, we call to thee, goddess of bestial entities, to help us now in this deadly fight, by blessing us with all your might."

The fire in the copper pot instantly subsided, along with every candle that had been lit in the room, robbing the attic of light completely when the chandelier flickered on and off, before blasting off a few sparks and ceasing to function. Emma looked around wildly, waiting for something to happen, the only source of light coming from the moon which was now casting a pale silver glow across everything it touched and adding to the cloud of anxiety that hung in the room. Darrin and Josh had also gone quiet in the wake of these events, choosing to growl lowly threateningly, as if to warn off any unwanted intruders.

"Great, so we have a spell that causes a power cut." Piper sighed, shaking her head in annoyance. "Phoebe, are you sure you transcribed that spell from book correc-_Whoa_!"

Both Piper and Paige took a step back from their sister, whose eyes were now glowing fiercely with the light of the fire that had been burning in the cauldron a few seconds ago. She turned to her siblings, making them take another step back as Piper kept trying to freeze her. "What do you request?" She asked, her voice melded with another. One that was ancient and dripped with wisdom.

Paige, catching on to the fact that the goddess they had intended to summon had decided to take a human vessel, spoke on her sisters' behalf. "Um… Could make these animals as docile as… kittens?" She asked nervously, scowling when she could imagine Piper rolling her eyes at her word choice as she stood behind her.

Phoebe smirked, raising her right arm as a pinion of light licked around her hand before extending outwards both ways, forming a giant glowing bow in the witch's hand. She positioned her free arm just behind the bow, another wisp of energy flowing from her palm and growing outwards, taking on the shape of an arrow. Her glowing eyes narrowed as she took aim, releasing the arrow at her first target, when instantly conjuring another arrow and firing it at the second werewolf.

Light exploded from the beasts as the arrows hit them. Both of them roared in momentary pain, before it seemed to subside, returning the two werewolves to their previous state, but this time, they were sitting obediently in their crystal cages, as if they were waiting for an order. "It is done." Phoebe spoke in the mixed voice once again, before a strand of golden light flew from her chest and right through the ceiling. She gasped as she regained control of her body, glaring at the floor as she bent over, placing her hands on her knees.

"Docile as kittens?" Piper questioned her youngest sibling with cynicism.

"Well, it worked, didn't it?" She snapped back.

"Why am I always the one to be possessed by gods?" Phoebe whined, pulling herself to her full height once more.

"You just give off a divine aura, Pheebs." Piper said with a smirk as she moved towards the two crystal cages with two bowls, each of them filled with the potion that would vanquish the werewolf within. "Okay, are we ready?" She asked Emma, who was ready to throw a stun potion if necessary.

"Go for it." She replied, drawing her arm back into a prime throwing position, although in reality, she probably wouldn't be able to react fast enough if the werewolf attacked.

Bending down and never taking her eyes off the trapped beast, Piper knelt down, placing the bowls at her sides, before slowly removing a crystal from the circle and diffusing the golden bolts of energy that had held the cage in the first place.

All four of them tensed up at the thought of the werewolf being free, each of them ready to scatter the moment it made any kind of move. It raised its head, its nostrils twitching as it inhaled the scent it was focusing on. Turning its amber eyes on Piper, the creature prowled towards her on all fours before its gaze turned to the floor, spying the potion and completely unaware of the fact that Piper, due to her fear, had taken in a breath and had accidentally massed out.

The werewolf lowered its snout to the bowl, and to everyone's surprise, began drinking from the potion. "Quick." Piper said, picking up the other bowl and moving to the cage that was keeping Josh imprisoned. "We need to get both of them cured to make sure Pam turns back before she does something she'll regret."

* * *

"What the hell?"

Annabelle watched on with her two companions in confusion as they found the source of the noise. All three of them could only stare at the spectacle of Pamela fighting with the cloaked being, the latter of whom held a deadly looking sai and was using it without hesitation. It cut a shallow slash into Pamela's belly, making her roar with agony as she gnashed and swiped her claws at her enemy, but due to the poor light and the darkness of the being's disguise, it was hard to hone in on him.

"Is it a demon?" Aidan asked, waiting for confirmation from either Annabelle or Leo. For all they knew, this person was just a misguided werewolf hunter who thought that he was doing a good thing.

"One way to find out…" The mercenary replied, raising her hand as a crackling neon blue sphere burst to life in her palm. She waited for the correct moment, before launching the energy ball with expert precision towards her target. They all waited for the usual buzz of electricity whenever an energy ball collided with a target, but when the projectile hit the being's back, it merely fizzled out on contact. "He's immune to my powers…"

Leo's eyes widened with both fear and anger as he raised his fists, lightning running up and down his forearms, "Witch hunter!" He yelled, before throwing his arms forward and releasing two powerful streaks of electricity just as the witch hunter turned to them to receive the full brunt of the attack, sending him flying across the clearing and landing slumped in the hard soil with a thud, twitching and buzzing from the electric assault.

The trio began to advance on the witch hunter, before they heard a whimper of pain come from where Pamela had been growling a few moments ago. They turned, and to their surprise, found the witch standing there, completely naked in her human form. Blood was pouring from her face and the slash she had along her stomach. Both Leo and Aidan averted their eyes as Annabelle shrugged off her jacket, wrapping it around the injured witch just before she toppled to the ground.

"He's gone…" Leo said distantly, looking at the spot where the witch hunter had landed after his attack and finding it to be empty.

"That's the least of our problems right now." Aidan said, "Can you heal her?"

"Not if that weapon was blessed with the witch hunter's blood." Leo replied, kneeling down to his injured niece and holding his hands over the places where blood was now soaking through Annabelle's jacket. He shook his head when his hands refused to light up, biting his lip. "It's no use."

"Okay, you guys take her to Brennan's friend at the hospital, and I'll go back to the Manor and tell the girls what happened." The elemental said, shooting a look of concern towards young witch before vanishing in a tower of glowing water that, when it collapsed to the ground, left no trace of him ever being there.

"Let's go." Annabelle breathed, preparing to vanish as well just as Leo placed a hand on Pamela's ankle so he could orb her. By mere chance, the two of them activated their powers at the same time, creating a beautiful fusion as a cloud of orbs enveloped the trio, before it burst into millions of blue-white lights and scattered into the night sky.

* * *

"Here." Piper said, shoving the brown paper bag in Darrin's direction. "There are some clothes for you and Josh to get you started." She explained, clasping her hands together as Darrin looked through the bag examining all the clothes. "Josh looks about Wyatt's size, and since I'm trying to bring my husband off plaid, this works perfectly. I know that you probably have tons of clothes, but I thought 'fresh start, fresh clothes'…" She gave him a beaming smile. After the night she had had of seeing her past selves involved in acts of death, it was reassuring to know that she could still help innocents like this.

Darrin beamed back at her, "You have no idea what you've done for us." He said, looking over his shoulder to see Josh and Wyatt saying their goodbyes to one another. "I don't think I can ever repay you. It's as if you've taken our lives off pause." He narrowed his eyes, thinking of a way to thank her, before settling on the best thing he could some up with, "Hey, if you ever need any legal advice, call me up."

"You're a lawyer?"

"Yeah. Well… I used to be. And who knows? Maybe, thanks to you, I will be again." He looked down into the bag, "Man, Megan is going to be so happy when she comes back from Vancouver." After seeing Piper's look of confusion at his statement, he decided to elaborate. "My wife. She goes up to our cabin in Vancouver during the full moon; I didn't want her to get hurt… Now, I guess I don't need to worry about that."

Piper looked down at the floor, a little embarrassed at all the praise. "I can't really take all the credit. It was my sister that made the potion that saved you. I just administered it really. In fact, I wasn't even here for most of it…"

He shook his head, smiling a little at the fact that she didn't understand what he was talking about. "You invited us into your home. You do realize that most people, knowing what you knew, would have wanted us dead, right?"

The eldest Charmed One had to smirk at the irony, thinking of the countless people that would want witches dead if they knew of their existence. "Yeah, well, I'm not exactly most people, so I guess you lucked out there." The two of them looked over to see Josh standing expectantly behind his father, taking this as a hint to say their goodbyes. "It was great to meet you, and it was great for our book. It now has tons of new info on werewolves."

Darrin grinned, before frowning, "Uh… you're welcome I think." He chuckled, turning towards the door and putting a hand around the back of his son's neck, "C'mon, buddy. Let's go give your Mom the good news!"

Piper watched as they left, her gaze growing distant as she continued to stare at the same place, even after the front door shut behind the now mortal pair. Heaving a great sigh, she finally began to relax for the first time in two days, before she felt a hand on her shoulder that reminded her that all of this was far from over. "Are you ready to go back?" Leo asked her, his hand drifting down her arm to take her hand and giving it a reassuring squeeze.

"Yeah, let's go."

* * *

Phoebe slowly descended the steps that led into the basement of her room. With both her and Brennan having an interest in martial arts and athletics, it had made sense to turn this into their own personal gym space. Although recently, for her husband, it had become more of a place to relieve stress instead of a place to keep fit. She assumed that's what he was doing right now, given the force in which he was pummeling the punching bag with fists. She rolled her eyes and let out a sigh when she saw his knuckles, "You're about three punches away from tearing your hands to shreds. Put on some tape." She said, grabbing the roll of training tape that lay on a shelf that had been put up before they had moved in.

"I don't need it." Brennan replied, continuing to punch until he heard the scratchy noise of the tape being pulled from the roll. He turned to see Phoebe standing a few feet away from him, still holding on to the length of tape she had unraveled with her face like thunder.

"Just get over here and let me tape you up." She gritted her teeth when he smirked a little at the unintended innuendo. "No jokes; just do it." She snapped.

Sensing that this wasn't the time to argue with her, Brennan moved towards his wife and held out his hands. It was amazing. Even though he was over a foot taller than her, Phoebe had a look that could make him feel like he was as tall as her ankle. It was that look he was receiving right now as she put the tape around his hands. "So… I spoke to your friend, Dr. Peters last night while he was stitching Pam's face up." His heart sank. "Why didn't you tell me that you had quit your job?"

Silence. The mutant really didn't know what to tell her, but seeing as how her powers allowed to her see into almost every single orifice of his psyche, the truth was probably the best thing to go with. "I just wasn't happy there anymore." He said simply. "I don't get to see my kids as much as I want, and all I get at the end of a fourteen hour shift is a headache. And if anything, what's happened recently has taught me to spend as much time with the people I love…"

She surveyed him silently for a while before answering, "Well, I can understand that…" Phoebe said quietly, keeping her eyes down on the task of tenderly wrapping up her husband's hands in training tape. "And I guess with the sixty thousand dollars you got from your Mom's life insurance policy, you can afford to be unemployed for a few decades." She looked up, her gaze like stone. "Oh, did you forget to mention that too?"

"How did you find out about that?"

"Brennan, it was my turn to pay the bills this month. If you wanted to hide that amount of money, you probably shouldn't have put it into our household account. It took me numerous calls to the bank and a few messages to your Mom's lawyer to figure out why we were suddenly in the black when it would have been a whole lot easier just to hear it from your mouth." She went back to wrapping up his hands, "Why didn't you tell me about any of this?"

Brennan held her gaze for a few moments, before he turned away, rubbing his head. "I dunno!" He exclaimed, his voice raised in irritation rather than anger. "I've just been all over the place recently; you can understand where I'm coming from, right?"

"Yeah." Phoebe replied softly, gesturing for him to back over so she could finish taping up his fists. She guided him over the steps, where they sat down so she could complete the task. "I'm just… I'm a little hurt at the fact that I had to hear about these two big things from other people, when it should have been you that told me. Do you understand where _I'm_ coming from?" She asked with a little smirk, tying off the gauze-like material on his right hand and putting her own hand over his. "Is there anything _else_ you're not telling me?"

Brennan pursed his lips, grimacing a little at the fact that his indifference about this was what was causing his stress. "My… powers haven't really been working lately." He frowned when she started to chuckle at this confession. "What's so funny?" He asked, hurt at her callous behaviour.

"Sorry…" Phoebe said, unconvincingly, "It's just that… I know about that too." She suppressed a giggle at the look on his face as she told him this. "Aidan saw you fail to spark up when Pam was attacking you, so he told Paige, which led to Paige telling me about it after all the drama was over."

"And you're not mad about _that_?"

She narrowed her eyes, a coy smile on her lips. "You'd think I would be, but I'm not. Mainly because Paige launched into this pretty nonsensical rant about men being sensitive about magical impotency, and it actually kinda made sense." She frowned, looking up a little. "I actually can't remember _how_ it made sense, but it did." The two of them shared a laugh, before Phoebe gripped his hand tightly. "You need to stop putting up this front when it comes to your feelings, Bren. I see right through it, regardless of powers, and to be honest, you act like an ass when you're trying to block out your feelings."

"Well… since you asked to nicely… Alright." He replied, grinning a little. "So, are you okay being the main source of income of the house?"

Phoebe nodded firmly. "Yeah, I mean, even without the sixty thousand dollars, we've got savings for stuff like this, so don't worry about it." The two of them sat in silence for a few moments, before a smirk spread across the middle Charmed One's face. "So that means that you, Brennan Mulwray, are a kept man!" She grinned and laughed at his mocked and exaggerated groan of despair as he placed his hands over his face. "You can take my purse tomorrow and buy yourself something pretty!"

"Oh yeah?" Brennan asked, leaning in to her face a little, "And what exactly will I have to do earn my keep?"

"Oh… We'll see."

* * *

Pamela undid the bottom four buttons of her blouse, sighing at her reflection in the mirror before she opened up her top slightly. It was the first time in a long while that she hadn't been fixated with the scar on her face, but this time, it was the scar that extended horizontally across her stomach. Her gaze traveled up her reflection to stare at the ghostly pale face that stared back at her. Her lip was burst, her eye was black, and there was a small cut just underneath her mouth. It had been a cruel twist of irony that the scar that caused her the most pain looked the most elegant, with a row of small white strips covering up the slash.

"I still think you look beautiful, Miss."

She turned to her open window to find Arc perching on the ledge, his mismatched wings closing in on his stone body as he completed his landing. "What are you doing here? I though you trying to get a date with one of those female gargoyles from 74th Street that you were flying around with a few nights ago."

He raised his head proudly, spreading his wings a little. "When the Mistress is in danger, everything else must be ignored in favour of protecting you. Believe me when I say, Miss, that I would sooner sacrifice my own life before letting that urchin put such fear in you ever again."

The sad thing was, Pamela thought, that she knew he would follow through on that promise if the situation ever arose. "No way, I'm not having you waste your day looking after me. I barely managed to convince Dean to go out and get the groceries instead of not taking his eyes off me, and I'm not going to go through the same thing with you. At least one of us should be getting some. So go and get your date, and don't take her to dinner out of a trash can. Take her to the Potion Bottle and tell Knave to put it on my tab."

"Are you certain, Miss?" Pamela nodded at his question as she buttoned up the bottom half of her shirt once again. Arc turned to the window, spreading out his large wings as far as they would go in the window space, "Then I bid you adieu." He said grandly, before launching himself off the ledge and flying away so fast that no one on the street below would ever notice him.

"Shouldn't you be at work?"

She didn't need to turn around, and if she was being honest with herself, she didn't want to turn around. "Actually, they're allowing me to email it in for the next few weeks." She replied, finally deciding to turn around and face Keith and watching his reaction to her additional injuries. "Mainly due to the fact that everyone seems to be giving me that look."

"What the hell happened?" Keith asked, walking into her room a little more and sitting down on the edge of the bed, looking up at her with his piercing blue eyes and waiting for an answer to come. He took her silence as admission, "The witch hunter got you again, right?"

"Yeah," Pamela pointed to her black eye. "Who knew that you could bless fists with blood, huh?" She said, smiling slightly. "With the amount of effort this guy's putting in to blessing all of his weapons, he's going to be anemic before I even get to kick his ass around the city." She placed a hand delicately on her stomach, wincing a little as she sat down from the pain of the slash across the gut. "The good news is that these stitches will just dissolve in like, a week's time, so once this scar stops causing me grief, I'll be back to normal."

Keith smiled bitterly, prodding her duvet absentmindedly as he traced the pattern with his eyes, "Now, see, I know you well enough to know that that just isn't true." He said, looking back up at her again. "How you really feeling?"

Pamela took a deep breath, shaking her head a little as she too stared down at her duvet, tears stinging her eyes. "I keep thinking that… if I just keep on going, then things will just stay perfectly fine. But… the more I fight it, the more I end up getting hurt." She looked up, her eyes showing more vulnerability than they had in an extremely long time. "This guy scares the hell outta me… I don't how to stop him, I'm powerless against him, and there's a very high chance of me dying the next time I meet him…"

Keith slowly opened up his arms and she fell into them willingly, allowing him to wrap them around her back and place his chin on her shoulder. "Listen to me, I'm…" He trailed off, pausing and revising his statement. "We're not going to let anything get to you, alright? You've got Dean, Jordann… me." She pulled away, looking into his eyes and forming an intense stare with him. "So stop worrying about it. If you remember correctly, I am _always_ right."

Pamela smacked him playfully on the arm, smirking a little. "You wish!" She exclaimed, before drying her eyes in the most sophisticated manner she muster and smiling warmly at him. "Thank you."

* * *

"Leo, I really don't want to do this…" Piper hissed, seemingly on the verge of going hysterical with panic as they waited for the scene to unfold within the dark and dingy apartment that even as ghosts, the two of them could smell the stench of sweat and smoke. "We both already know what I did, so I don't think we need to have it replayed right in front of our eyes." She continued to pace while Leo leaned against the wall next to the door. "Say something!" She snapped.

"Why?" Leo replied, well trained in dealing with wife's many rants and tempers. "Piper, we can't leave until you've done this, neither you nor I can change that. Phoebe and Paige summoning you away was a one off. Now, you have to follow it all the way through to end." He replied calmly, his eyes widening as he heard something behind the door. "Here we go…"

The door swung open, casting a cold glow into the apartment from the hallway outside, a glow that was momentarily blocked by the two bodies wrapped around one another that were now entering. The door was slammed shut by the guy, briefly taking his hand off Past Piper's rear to smack the door with his palm. He walked forward, not breaking their kiss until the backs of her knees hit the edge of the bed, when Past Piper pulled away and gave him a small smile. "Maybe we should slow down a bit…" She said, out of breath.

The man groaned in disappointment, leaning in for another kiss, "C'mon, baby…" He breathed, kissing her neck, "We were just getting to the good part." He added, pushing on her body once again and making them both fall onto the bed, the squeaking of the mattress springs making the moment seem even cheaper to Leo while his wife watched behind her fingers.

The couple continued to kiss one another with wild abandon, the guy's hand trailing down Past Piper's body, his fingers sliding up the bottom of her halter top and caressing her smooth skin, before he moved his hand back down to try and fumble the top button of her jeans loose. This was when Past Piper's eyes flashed back open, as she had been drowning in the effects of ecstasy his kisses had left her with. She laughed nervously as she tried to jokingly push him off. "Easy there…" She said, smirking when he looked up.

"Don't be a tease…" He growled, lifting his upper body up so he could take his t-shirt off and throw it to the floor. Piper didn't even realize that he had her pinned down to the bed by straddling her legs. "I hate a tease…" He warned, before diving back down and capturing her lips in another kiss, his hands going down to her jeans again.

By this time, Past Piper had had enough. She placed her hands on his left flank and pushed as hard as she could, shoving him right off the side of the bed and allowing her to jump off the other side. "I didn't buy you all those drinks for nothing, bitch!" He roared, getting up from the floor and striding around the bed, grabbing Past Piper's arms and throwing her back down to the bed, her head colliding with the nightstand on the other side. "I'm gonna get my money's worth…" He placed his hands on his belt, beginning to undo the buckle.

Past Piper placed her hand to her head, seeing that she had hit it off the nightstand and it was now bleeding. There was a clatter behind her and she turned over on the bed to see whatever had fallen off the nightstand by her striking it by accident. It was there, her saviour. It was amazing that she hadn't even noticed it before. A well polished, silver gun.

"I can't watch…" Piper whimpered, turning into Leo's chest with her hands over her face.

Snatching up the gun, Past Piper flipped onto her back and held it up just as her attacker went to pounce upon the bed. She hadn't meant to shoot, only to scare him into backing off, but she had been caught off guard by him leaping onto her and she pulled the trigger. There was a deafening bang which made both Piper and Leo jump in shock, and blood spurted all over the low ceiling as he fell limp onto her body.

"Oh my God…" Leo breathed, putting a nervous arm around his wife as she turned around to face the scene.

There was a time lapse as the scene began to fade away and was replaced with something. This time, the lamp on the nightstand had been turned on, the man's body was bleeding out all over the sheets of the bed, and Past Piper was pacing nervously back and forth in front of the door. Blood covered her chest, completely soaking her top and staining her exposed skin. There was a knock at the door, making Past Piper flinch in fright. "Who is it?" She asked in a high pitched voice, her hands shaking as she raised them to her face.

"It's Prue! You called me, remember?" Prue's muffled voice shouted sarcastically behind the door. "Now, let me in! I had to kick a hobo in the face in the elevator just to get him to back off!" Past Piper walked briskly towards the door, her shaky hands fumbling multiple times as she tried to undo all the locks. She opened it, grabbing her big sister by the arm and yanking her into the apartment, closing the door after her. "Piper, what the hell are you…?" She trailed off, staring at the dead body that had now turned the whole bed sheet crimson, "Oh my God."

"I'm so sorry, Prue. I didn't know who else to call!" Past Piper whimpered, standing back from her sister and taking in her reaction.

"Oh my _God_, Piper!" Prue shouted scathingly, turning towards her and pointing towards the dead body. "You've done a lot of stupid crap over the past year, but this about blows it all away just as much as you blew him away by the looks of things!" She screamed, turning back to the deceased man. "Why did you _even_ drag me into this? You should have called the cops!"

"I shot him, Prue!" Piper shouted back, now angry at her eldest sister's self absorbed attitude at this moment in time. "He was coming at me, and I shot him! He didn't give me any bruises or anything, so what the hell do I have to prove that it was in self defense?" She lost what remained of her rage and went back to weeping, placing a hand on Prue's shoulder to try and plead with her. "Please… you have… you have to help me!"

Prue looked back into her sister's shattered gaze, narrowing her emerald eyes in confliction. She didn't know it yet, but when she eventually became a witch, this would be the moment she would draw all her strength from. "Wrap him up in the bed sheets and stick the gun in his hand." She said darkly in a business like tone, turning her attention to the corpse on the bed. "I'll find something to tie it all together." She frowned when Piper seemed to now be paralyzed in the shock of what she had done. "_Do it!_"

Piper and Leo watched this unfold, Piper wearing a similar expression to the one her past self was wearing. "We took the guy's car, stuffed him in the trunk, and started to head to Lake Skylark." She murmured, tears silently falling from her doe brown eyes. "But then we had to stop for gas. When Prue went to pay, I, for some _stupid_ reason, went to check on the body in the trunk… That's what was on the footage Cid Bugle tried to blackmail me with…"

The scene switched again, and this time, the couple found themselves on the shore of Lake Skylark. It took their eyes a few seconds to adjust the sudden darkness, but once they did, they could see the clear outline of the car that Piper had mentioned. It had been reversed to the very edge of the flimsy dock to allow Past Piper and Prue to lift the body out of the car and walk with it for as small a distance as possible.

"Shit!" Prue hissed, spotting a few droplets of blood on the wooden decking under the moonlight. "He's starting to drip. Move faster!" She ordered, walking quicker to spur Piper to do the same. Once they reached the edge of the dock, they turned sideways, so each of them stood at a corner. "Okay, on the count of three?"

"Alright…" Past Piper murmured, barely holding on thanks to the many heavy rocks and boulders they had filled the sheet with to make sure it sank with its contents.

"One…" They began to swing the body back and forth for momentum, "Two… three!" They let it go, the body flying forward a couple of feet before landing in the water with a loud splash, and sinking into the murky depths almost immediately. Neither of them knew it at the time, but the Water Demon had unwittingly aided them in their cover up by devouring the dead body that had been thrown into its domain.

"We burned the car, along with my bloodied clothes… And never spoke of it again…" Piper croaked, as if she were narrating the whole thing. She finally let out a sob, spinning on her husband and hitting him hard on the chest. "_Why?_" She screamed, hitting him again. "Why did you have to bring me back here? Why did you put me through all of _this_?"

"Don't you see, Piper?" Leo asked in an exasperated tone, gently grabbing her by the arms and staring into her tearful eyes. "Death has ultimately shaped the person you've become today. Your first past life killed out of anger and vengeance, which was carried on into your next past life, where you killed without even blinking. But you atoned for all that in your next life, only killing when it was the last resort. And here…" He looked over her shoulder to see Past Piper and Prue get back into the car. "… It was an accident. You didn't even have the intention to kill… You don't even have the heart to do it consciously, because you are a beautiful person with a kind soul… A kind soul that's had to endure more than a decade of guilt tearing it to shreds just because you can't forgive yourself…"

"How can I forgive myself, Leo?" Piper asked; her mind weary from everything she had seen in past two days of time traveling. "I _killed_ someone and I didn't even pay for it. Everything I've earned since then is built on a _lie_!"

"No, it hasn't." Leo stated firmly. He wouldn't let his wife think that she was a pad person. "Because you make up for your past in every demon that you vanquish, every innocent that you save, every time you sacrifice your own needs for someone else… That is the very meaning of atonement; to learn from your past mistakes and to set things right in everything you do."

Piper's shoulders drooped from their raised position. She would always get tense during an argument, but this time she had just run out of energy. She turned around, staring out into the inky black water and thinking how this place was a haven for Paige and Aidan, and yet to her, it was a symbol of everything she wanted to leave behind. It was at this point she decided to take Leo's advice and do just that; leave it all behind and look towards the future.

The eldest Charmed One backed into her husband's strong arms, reveling in his warmth as he wrapped them around her body and let her head fall back onto his chest. "Let's go home…"

* * *


	29. To Paint The Perfect Picture

**To Paint The Perfect Picture**

"All I see is a blob."

Paige rolled her eyes at Aidan's lack of artistic vision before looking around the large open expanse of the gallery to see if anyone had heard that comment. Luckily, they were the only ones in this section, and the twins were fully enjoying this wide open empty space by playing tag with one another, so they weren't causing trouble. "You have absolutely no imagination whatsoever." The witchlighter said, holding her hand up the painting as if she was presenting it. "It isn't just a blob; it's the final masterpiece of a man's creativity, confusion and insanity before he fades into obscurity. It's amazing, really," She looked back at her husband, disappointed at the blank expression on his face. "Oh, fine. Go and wait in the car with the kids and I'll be out in twenty minutes."

Aidan grinned at this, putting an arm around her waist and pulling her towards him for a quick kiss on the check. "Love you." He said, walking away from her backwards, "Enjoy your blob!" He shouted brightly, his proclamation echoing through the large gallery and making his children giggle before they vanished behind the wall as they left this section.

The witchlighter took a deep breath as she moved towards the next piece, her heels clicking against the wooden floor and sending an echo throughout the room. This kind of silence was something she wasn't used to at home, and if she had to be honest with herself, it was something she craved. "Wow…" She breathed, seeing that this painting was the work of Alicia James, one of her favourite modern artists.

"You like what you see?"

Paige jumped at the break of silence and turned around to see a blonde woman with cat-like features walking towards her, a smart black suit hugging her figure. "Yeah." Paige replied, turning back to the painting which was of a man huddled in the corner of a massive empty room with a spread of stars above him. "I love how James has managed to convey how the man's entrapment in this massive area, and how the thick brushstrokes of the night sky give an overall harsh painting some tenderness."

The woman smiled widely, turning on her heel towards a painting on the side wall. "Tell me, what do you think of this piece?" She asked, looking over her shoulder as Paige walked over to examine it.

"Ah, see, while I'm a big fan of Alicia James, I think her earlier pieces are trying too hard to be edgy." She said, shaking her head a little at the painting of a naked woman trapped in a bed of vines and nettles. "'Crow's Nest' is unnecessarily cold and vicious, while the paint looks like it was applied during a rage. I mean, I'm all for emotion in art, but it should translate into the painting, not the paintbrush."

"Hmm… I see where you're coming from." The woman said. "I painted this after my boyfriend broke up with me so I think I let my emotions stray into the canvas a little too much." She held out her hand, smirking. "Alicia James."

Paige's jaw dropped. She had never actually seen pictures of this woman, and it hadn't occurred to her for one second that an artist would even bother talking to her. "Paige Matthews." She replied, shaking the offered hand. "And I'm so sorry, if I had known…"

"… Then I wouldn't have got an honest answer, would I?" Alicia replied, sighing mournfully and putting her hands behind her back. "I never get an honest answer out of most of the stuffed shirts that come to the fundraisers and events, and I hardly ever get the chance to be out on the floor tricking people like yourself. Hell, the only reason I found you was because I was doing the walkthrough that I do every morning… Which begs the question; what exactly are you doing here at nine in the morning?"

Paige shrugged, "Why else?" She gestured to the walls around her, "Art."

Alicia smiled curiously at this early morning visitor to the gallery, before starting to walk away from her and gesturing for Paige to come with her. "Walk with me."

* * *

"C'mon, little kitty…" Pamela crooned, kneeling down next to the decaying dining table and trying to coax out her target. Her target in this case, being a deathly thin, coal black cat with wild fur which she had been trying to catch for the past hour. The witch didn't even know how the cat had got into the Walker apartment, as it was on a high floor of the building, and she always locked the door when she left. "I'm not gonna hurt you." She murmured softly, holding out her hand and locking her gaze with the creature's sharp amber eyes. "That's it…" The cat began to nervously walk towards her hand, sniffing it curiously as Pamela reached under the table and picked it up, bringing it into her arms as she stood up.

On a closer inspection, it was clear that the cat had had to fight just to survive. Numerous faded cuts could be seen on the bare skin where fur had been ripped out by its opponent; the most prominent injury being a cut across its nose that looked as if it had been there for quite a while. "Poor little thing… You better not have any diseases." She added darkly, smiling when the cat purred at her touch. "C'mon, let's go do what I set out to do in the first place."

With neither Dean nor Keith letting her out of their sight recently, life at home had been a little claustrophobic for the Halliwell witch. The two of them had finally left –having school and a job interview–, leaving Pamela to finally escape their over protective cocoon and venture out of the apartment. Perhaps it was the fact that she had been cooped up for so long that had spurred her sudden courage, but she didn't really care. Today was the day she was going to get a premonition from that room.

As she approached that taped door, the cat in her arms began to squirm a little, making it hard for Pamela to keep a hold on her. "It's okay, kitty. I'm a little scared too…" She admitted to the animal quietly, outstretching a shaking hand and ripping down the police tape. "Alright, no going back now… And no more talking to myself."

She stepped into the room, tucking the cat under her arm as she looked around the large bedroom with fear dazzling in her eyes. The faint smell of treated wood and, to her horror, blood entered her nostrils, her nose twitching slightly from their intensity. The former of the two seemed to be coming from what remained of a four poster bed, its posts now in various states of erosion as they left shards of wood all over the rotted sheets. It was a haunting image; as a bed was meant to signify everything that this bed wasn't. Besides from the large marble fireplace, it seemed to be the only piece of furniture in the room. Pamela presumed the rest had been taken by the police for forensic testing, and since no one lived in the apartment in the incident, they saw no reason to return it.

Nervously gesturing towards the windows, Pamela flinched at the echoing groan as they were opened under her telekinetic guidance, the frame moving upwards and allowing the early spring breeze into the room. _If only that could get rid of the smell_,she thought, moving towards the fireplace and placing her palm firmly onto it. Nothing. Not even the slightest tingle of a psychic energy. She frowned, looking around the bedroom with a sigh and just about resisting the urge to blast the window panes out of their frames in a blaze of anger.

It was in her final sweep of the room that she noticed something on the floor. Bending down to inspect it, she tucked her hair behind her ear so it wouldn't impair her vision as she looked down at the faded mark. After blowing away some of the dirt, it became apparent what the stain was, and how it was guaranteed to give her the premonition she wanted. It was a patch of dried in blood.

Now not being to able contain her excitement and terror, Pamela was shaking from head to toe, so much so that the cat in her arms began to squirm yet again, but it was kept in the witch's gentle but firm grasp as she slowly lowered her trembling hand down to the floor.

"What are you doing?"

Startled, Pamela suddenly fell back, landing on the hard ground with a bump and loosing grip of the cat in the process. "No, come back, kitty!" She called after it as it ran out the door, brushing past the legs of the person that had frightened the witch in the first place. "What are you doing here, Trent?" She snapped at her older sibling, scowling at him from the floor as he walked towards her.

"Probably the same thing you are." Trent replied, offering his hand as a way of helping her up. She reluctantly accepted, slapping her palm into his and letting him pull her to her feet.

"I seriously doubt that, unless you acquired the power of premonition during your nine year absence." Pamela sniped, brushing her backside from the dirt on the floor before wiping her hand on the side of her jacket, similar to the way a child would wipe their cheek after receiving a kiss from an elderly relative.

"You know, I'm going to stop trying soon…" He replied sadly, "I mean; there're only so many little jibes I can take before I give up."

"Really?" Pamela asked brightly, smiling innocently at him, "So, how many more jibes can you withstand? Because if I can break that limit today, then that would make everything in my life just perfect."

Before he could retort, the sound of glass smashing, followed by a yelp, echoed through the apartment. Instantly, the two of them froze at the noise, before the black cat suddenly ran back into the room, slowing down at Pamela and rubbing itself against her legs. "C'mon…" She said, picking up the cat and striding past Trent. "Let's go check that out." The witch had just about left the room before she stopped on the threshold, turning around, "Well? Are you coming?"

Trent blinked a few times before going after her. "I thought you were talking to the cat…"

The two of them combed the apartment, finding nothing in the usual places Pamela would normally find demons waiting to attack her. It wasn't until they met back up in the main hallway that they realized there was one room they hadn't checked, and its door was ajar. "Your old room…" Trent said to her quietly as they stood outside, turning to his younger sibling. "Ladies first?"

"Wuss…" Pamela growled in response, taking a few steps back from the door and putting both arms around the animal in her hold, before raising her leg and smacking her foot into the door, causing it to fly off the hinges due to its age and lack of care. There was another squeal of fear from inside as the two of them strode into the room, immediately scanning the room for enemies until they settled on something in the corner of the room, "What the hell…?"

A girl, no older than eighteen, was huddled in the corner, trembling underneath a thick blue blanket that Pamela immediately recognized as the throw that had gone missing from her room a few weeks ago. And as she looked around the room, a lot of things that had gone missing from the apartment over the last couple of months were all here. Pamela's NYU sweater that had been three sizes too big for her, Keith's skiing jacket, and nearly all the contents of their refrigerator. "Please!" The girl shrieked on the verge of tears, standing up and revealing a large bump in her midsection that was currently covered by the blanket. She was pregnant. "Don't hurt me!"

"Oh my God…"

* * *

Phoebe couldn't hold in her giggles anymore as she got her children out of the backseat of her car. At this moment in time, Lexa was struggling to get out of the passenger seat, her large belly impeding her efforts to get up from such a low riding car, "Need any help there, Miss Independent Woman?" She laughed a little, offering her hands to her struggling friend and helping the fellow mutant to her feet, before going back to releasing Faith from her car seat in the back.

Lexa clasped her hand tightly around Connor's. They had parked on a rather busy road, and she wasn't about to let her godson come to any harm. "I could have totally got up from that seat in my own time if I wasn't hurrying to helpfully supervise Connor while you unbuckled Faith." She said unconvincingly, swaying a little from the pressure of standing up and holding her balance on one of San Francisco's many hilly roads.

"Whatever." Phoebe replied with a smirk, hoisting Faith onto her hip and locking the car, "Oh, and sorry I couldn't get a better parking space. Your feet must be killing you right now." She said empathetically, remembering how hellish it was for her to be on her feet near the end of both pregnancies. "You didn't need to come, you know. You should have stayed in the house. I have a scar on my navel that proves that I know what you're going through. You should listen to me more."

The mutant waddled up the hill, silently thanking Connor for having small legs and letting her go at a slow pace. "I'm fine, really. I just can't wait until this stupid pregnancy is over so I can start to enjoy the good stuff like this…" Lexa replied, looking down at the boy who she had known since birth and beaming down at him. In her life, a smile like that had never really been required before coming into Mutant X.

"What are you hoping for then?" Phoebe asked.

"A boy." Lexa said nearly immediately, deciding to elaborate after seeing Phoebe's look of shock at the swiftness of her answer. "What? Don't look at me like that. Boys are so much easier to deal with. They're not as complicated as girls, and they usually have a better temperament. If I'm gonna be saddled with a kid for eighteen years, I don't want it to give me white hair before I'm old enough to pull it off gracefully. Plus, I can totally see a daughter easily manipulating Jesse to get her way out of a grounding."

"Yeah, but let's face facts here, Lex. Boy or girl, the kid's screwed if it gets your temperament." Phoebe sniggered, looking up as they reached their destination. "Fieldman Mechanics." The middle Charmed One announced out loud as they stood in front of the auto shop. She groaned when she realized the reason she was probably here. "I swear, if Brennan crashed his car into a mail box again while taking a corner too fast…"

"Well, if he did…" Lexa began; trailing behind Phoebe as they entered, looking around the main floor and seeing that it was completely empty, save for a few rusted pieces of machinery. "… He's going to be waiting an awful long time for service, by the looks of things."

Phoebe shook her head and reached into her purse, tightening her arm around Faith so she didn't drop her during her search. "I'm gonna call him and see if we're even at the right place." She announced, frowning when she couldn't locate her cellphone.

Lexa continued to look around the place as Phoebe's attention was occupied elsewhere. She grimaced at the pungent smell of gasoline and oil that seemed inescapable in this place. This was just one of the many things she had hated about pregnancy; the fact that all her senses would go into overdrive at the slightest hint of there being a smell. "Uh… Pheebs?" She called out as she looked upwards, her eyes widening, "I think it's a safe bet that Brennan's here after all…"

Phoebe looked up to see what Lexa was staring at, and her expression mirrored her friend's almost immediately. A large white sheet, dirtied from years of oil, ran been hung up on the wall, and in big block capitals, 'MULWRAY MECHANICS' had been written with luminous green spray paint, giving both women sore eyes. "Oh God, he didn't…" Phoebe groaned to herself.

"Surprise!" Brennan boomed happily as he came out of a small office on the other side of the space. It was that one word that made Phoebe's heart sank. She didn't need to read his emotions or thoughts to know what he had done. He was apparently not aware of the smear of oil on his cheek as he grinned broadly at his wife. "I was driving by it and saw the place had shut down, so I made a few calls and bought the place! What do you think?"

"I think…" Lexa said brightly, smirking a little as she turned around to see Phoebe's face paralyzed in a mixture of sheer rage and shock. "… That you're a dead man."

* * *

Piper hummed a light tune as she wiped down the bar countertop, a delicate smile playing on her lips. It was fragile enough to be broken at the slightest amount of ill, but if her mood persisted, it was a thing to behold. She never opened the bar of Thyme until two in the afternoon, so she thought she would give it a treatment of her own fastidious cleaning. After a surprise visit from the health inspector a few weeks ago, the eldest Charmed One had learned to make sure the restaurant was always as perfect as possible. "Find anything you like?"

Leo looked up from the leaflet he was reading at the end of the bar, a look of confliction on his face. "Piper, I really don't know if this would be a good idea." He confessed as she moved towards him, her smile cracking. "I mean, besides that fact that I'm pushing ninety, I don't think this kind of stuff would fulfill me, you know?"

"But lounging around the house for the rest of your days would?" Piper countered, putting a hand on her hip as she surveyed her husband with a confused glance. "I thought you were interested in one of those carpentry courses. You seemed really excited at the thought of being able to turn that into a family business." She waved her hand above her head as she spoke, as if she was painting the words in the air, "Wyatt & Sons!"

"Yeah, but Piper, the last time I went to school was in the thirties. That and I'd be going back as a person who's hitting middle age." Leo argued back, looking back down at the leaflet before resting it on the counter.

"But, honey, this is what these night classes are for." Piper replied, smiling softly at him and taking a look at the leaflet himself. "A lot of people want to take courses to get degrees, but they can't because life gets in the way. With this, you could spend the whole day with the kids, and then go to class in the evenings. And even if I had to work late one night, we could just hire a babysitter. That's hopefully the kind of world that we'll be living in after we vanquish the Hollow."

"The kind where people can hire a babysitter?" Leo asked, an amused smirk on his face.

"No." Piper answered, taking a serious tone, "The kind of world where we can hire a normal babysitter without worrying if she'll survive the night with taking care of three magical kids who are in constant danger of demons." Her voice went quiet. "I've already covered up one murder… I don't want to do it again." The two of them fell silent for a few moments, before Piper put down the cloth and sighed, "Look, are you regretting what you said about giving up your powers after we vanquish the Hollow? Because you just kinda casually mentioned it, and then I just jumped on it. So if you're having second thoughts…"

"No, it's not that." Leo replied immediately. "I wouldn't have even suggested it if I didn't mean it. I want to be able to grow old with you." He smiled, taking her hand and squeezing it affectionately, "It's just that I keep thinking how big a thing it is to try and adjust to. I mean, I've had powers for nearly seventy years. I don't really know how I would live without them."

"Well, let's just cross that bridge when we come to it, shall we?" Piper replied, taking his free hand in her own. "And, you know, nothing's set in stone. All of this can be decided after the Hollow's been vanquished and the demons are too scared to come anywhere near us. We don't have to have everything sorted out right now." She leaned over the counter, planting a tender kiss on his lips and grinning at him. "Don't worry about it."

The elder smiled in response, "Thanks."

"Oh! Am I interrupting something?" Paige said excitedly as she practically bounced towards them, a large grin plastered on her face that seemed to be permanent.

"Oh, no, it's okay. We were just-,"

"Later!" The witchlighter snapped impatiently as she hopped up onto a barstool, still grinning inanely before it vanished from her face due to regret, "I'm sorry, but I just have some really good news… I got a job!"

Piper's face lit up, "That's fantastic! What firm is it at?"

"Oh, it's not social work. I am… wait for it…" She looked between her sister and her brother in law, smiling with a twinkle in her eye as she held for her suspense. "The new curator and manager for the Taylor & Thomson Gallery down by the waterfront!" She suddenly went to reach into her purse, "I'm gonna call Phoebe and tell her the good news!"

"Oh! I wouldn't if I were you." Piper advised, "She called here earlier after having a row with Brennan. Apparently he blew most of the sixty grand on something really stupid without even consulting her, so she's pretty pissed right now." The three of them suddenly sat in a slightly uncomfortable silence at the thought of their calm day being ruined by this news.

"But hey!" Leo suddenly piped up, "Gallery curator, huh? That's pretty much your dream job. How did that even happen?"

"Well, I was looking at some art and just happened to bump into the artist. I pretty much showed that I kick ass when it comes to taste and interpretation with paintings, and next thing I know, she's got me in a room with Taylor & Thomson, and they're offering me a job." The high of freshly told good news began to fade as Paige finally started to calm down. She gave her sister a small smile, but it was one that radiated with happiness. "I start next Monday, which gives me the rest of the weekend to celebrate. How about we hang out at P3 tomorrow night? We'll consult Phoebe in a few hours when she's hopefully in a better mood."

"I would love to, but I have this woman paying me to host a benefit dinner, and since she's paying double of what I usually make in one night, I'm more than happy to oblige to her needs." Piper replied, "But I'm sure Emma will be more than happy to get out of the house, seeing as how we've finally reached an understanding about Lorna and she's happy to let the poor kid out of her sight for more than five seconds."

Paige's eyes widened, "Yes! Good idea. I haven't been out on the town with her since… Wow, it was probably for my thirty first birthday, about a week before her death." She frowned in thought, trying to summon something from her memory. "Come to think of it, Emma hasn't really been out at all, has she? I mean, apart from the circus of course."

"I guess that's the price for coming back from the dead." Piper replied sadly.

The two of them were interrupted when Leo suddenly looked up at the ceiling with a sigh before locking eyes with Piper, giving her an apologetic glance. "Sorry, they need my power so they have enough to try and sense something in the afterlife." He suddenly cringed a little, looking at the ceiling again. "Apparently, I just told you too much…" He groaned, "I'll be glad when all this over."

"Me too…" Piper murmured back, seeming to forget her sister's presence for a second as she shared a tender moment with her husband, before he –after looking around to see if anyone was watching– vanished in a column of bright blue and white lights that flew upwards towards the sky.

"What did he mean about 'all this' being over?" Paige asked, confused by her brother in law's choice of words before leaving.

"Oh, nothing. Just boring, _normal_ stuff…"

* * *

Keith cursed lowly as the wind once again thwarted his attempts to light a cigarette. He had to do all his smoking out on the tiny balcony of the living room that was normally used to house plants, as Pamela would always go off at him if she caught the slightest scent of cigarette smoke in the apartment. It was that, and he had told her he had quit a few months after they starting dating. "Damnit!" He hissed as the breeze battered down the small flame from his lighter once again. It didn't matter what angle he put his hand around it, the wind always seemed to knock out the fire. "You know, if your sister wasn't so damn scary, I would be free to smoke in my own apartment."

Dean, who was sitting the living room at the time, channel hopping with vague interest in the television, chuckled a little. "Well, this is _your_ apartment. Just threaten to kick her out if she starts complaining. Unless you like keeping secrets. Like, you know, the fact that you broke up with Carmine a couple days after Pam was attacked by the witch hunter?" He smirked a little at the fact Keith still hadn't told Pamela that he was single again. But given the circumstances of their break up, Dean could see the reasoning behind it.

"I could do that, couldn't I?" Keith mused, before sighing angrily and throwing the unused cigarette into a nearby plant pot. "But infuriatingly, I know she's totally right. It makes the place stink, it makes me stink, and it slowly kills me. She just had to go and take the fun out of a lethal habit."

The two of them were caught off guard momentarily when Trent suddenly barreled in the door, apparently out of breath. "You… hide… now…" He gasped out, pointing hurriedly to Dean who just sat on the sofa with wide eyes. "God, she has a lot of stuff…" Trent breathed, letting the large bag on his shoulder drop to the floor with a thud so he could recover from whatever exertion he had endured.

"Wait… I've seen that bag before…" Dean frowned, before his face went hollow as the answer hit him. "Shit!"

"My thoughts exactly." Pamela said coolly and darkly as she entered the apartment, stroking the black cat with white paws in her arms before letting it down on the floor so it could run off down the hallway. "Dean, I do believe you've met Gwen." She stated as the pregnant girl from the Walker apartment waddled in after her, a look of regret and sadness on her face as Dean's face drained of the pitiful amount of colour it had left. "I mean, after all, she is _carrying your child_!" The end of her sentence was said at such a volume that made all the room's occupants flinch with fright, prompting Keith to head for the door.

"I think I'm gonna leave you guys to it." He said. "She has that Carrie look going on." He added, before quickly grabbing his jacket from the back of the sofa and heading past the trio standing in the doorway. "By the way, I'm Keith." The mutant introduced himself to Gwen, shaking her hand politely. "You'll probably be staying here from now on if the pattern holds."

"I'm sorry." Pamela suddenly added, her tone going soft as she turned away from Dean, "I know that having another person-,"

"Don't mention it." He cut her off, smiling politely at the girl who was going to be his new guest. "Nice meeting you." He said, fixing the collar of his jacket before heading out towards the door, closing it gently behind him in preparation of the verbal carnage that he knew was about to ensue.

Dean cringed at the tense silence as Keith left. He resisted the urge to take a step back when Pamela's jaw clenched, and was surprised when she calmly walked towards Gwen's bag and picked out a large white towel that looked like it had been used as a blanket on the dirty floor of the Walker apartment. The witch considered the item for a moment, before dropping it back into the bag and turning to her brother's girlfriend. "Gwen, why don't you go and have a shower? After being _forced_…" She shot a side glare at Dean, "… to stay in that cold, dirty apartment for so long, you probably need freshening up. It's the second on your left, and you'll find towels on the rack."

"Um… Okay, thanks." Gwen replied, carefully padding through the space between Dean and Pamela, giving her boyfriend a look that was mixed with sympathy and apology before she vanished down the hallway.

"… Nice cat." Dean said softly as the animal in question emerged from where his girlfriend had just went, leaping up onto the back of the sofa and picking that spot as the place to groom its white paws delicately, its yellow eyes looking out inquisitively at Dean from a mass of jet black fur as it continued to tidy itself.

"I… don't even know where to begin." Pamela sighed wearily, looking at her younger sibling as she could see right through him. "I mean, you're only seventeen, you're in high school, you've got your whole life ahead of you, and you go and do something stupid like this? The phrase "What were you thinking?" seems a little redundant right now, as I'm pretty sure it was a lack of thought that got you into this mess in the first place." She snarled, her jaw clenching once again as she paused. "I can't believe you didn't think of using protection."

"We were both drunk!" Was Dean's weak rebuttal, "We had been invited to this party, Gwen didn't want to go, but I persuaded her… We both drank a little too much, one thing led to another and four months later, Gwen finds out that she's pregnant and it's too late for a termination." An awkward silence filled the room, only being interrupted by the odd mew from the cat, "Look, Pam, if money's the problem, then don't worry. I'll get a job and help you and Keith out."

"This isn't about money!" She shouted back, "This is about the fact that your life is essentially over, not to mention Gwen's. How do you expect to go to college when you've got a baby at home, needing constant attention?" The witch's face suddenly softened out of fatigue, running a hand through her thick dark hair and sighing, "Why did you even come here?"

"Because I thought you would understand and help me out!" Dean snapped back, losing his temper with her and deciding to turn to Trent, his gaze pleading, "C'mon, Trent. You understand, don't you?"

Pamela rolled her eyes in anticipation for the double pronged attack which she was about to come under, but instead her eyes widened in shock at Trent's answer. "Oh, don't you dare try and play us off one another, kid." The eldest of the trio warned, his arms folded and his eyes dark. "If you think for one second that I'm taking your side on this, then you're sorely mistaken. And what exactly were you expecting Pam to do? If you're old enough to get a girl pregnant, then you should be old enough to deal with the consequences."

Dean stood in the middle of the living room, stunned at this sudden turnabout of his two older siblings uniting, let alone against him. With a scowl, he shook his head at the pair of them, and stomped down the hallway like a child that had just been scolded by his parents and told to go to his room.

Pamela pouted a little as she and Trent shared the deadly silence of the room. She stared at her foot as she lightly tapped it against the floor. Even she had to admit to herself that if she had ended up arguing with both of her brothers; she probably would have been the one that would have stormed out. "Thanks for backing me up." She admitted quietly, "And… you know, not letting all the stuff between us interfere with your decision. I probably would have been a little pettier."

"I know." Trent said with a smirk, before it turned into a sincere smile, "And you're welcome."

* * *

Brennan finished folding up the banner with a tired sigh, the headlights from passing cars being the only thing that would light up the large expanse of property due to rats biting through the electricity cables months ago. He threw the sheet down onto the ground, kneeling down and using it as a cushion as he sat down on the floor, looking around his new purchase with defeated stare. "Welcome to Mulwray Mechanics…" He murmured to himself, tapping the ground with his fingers.

The echoing clack of high heels made his head shoot up as Phoebe entered, crossing the cold concrete and moving towards her husband with an unreadable glint in her eyes. She folded her arms and sighed as they shared the silence for a few more moments. "I left the kids with Lexa… We probably have about an hour before she explodes." She said, waiting for a witty response regarding Lexa's babysitting skills. She clenched her jaw in frustration when the response never came. "I'm sorry for losing it with you before. I was just a little… shocked."

"Yeah, I kinda got that from your rant." He replied, continuing to tap his fingers off the ground as Phoebe moved closer.

"Do you at least understand _why_ I lost it? I mean, you spent that huge amount of money and you didn't even bother to consult me first." She cut him off as he began to speak. "And I know that the money was left to you, Bren, but it's not just you that you have to look out for these days. It hasn't been just you for a while now. You've got a family. And that money could have been a little insurance for our kids' futures; instead you squandered it on…" She looked around the desolate garage, shaking her head angrily, "This!"

"If you think that I blew all that money on this dump then you're severely mistaken." Brennan argued back as he rose to his feet, towering over his wife as he glared down at her. "The kids were my first priority. A third of that money went to the college fund, ten thousand went to paying off the mortgage, and the rest went to this!" He shouted, holding his arms out as if he was presenting the property to her, "This, my dream, something that I could do every day with a smile on my face. A job that I could enjoy just as much as you enjoy yours."

"Don't you realize how risky is it to open your own business?"

"Piper seems to have done a damn good job with her _two_ businesses!"

Phoebe was about respond, but she realized that doing that would only prolong a fight that had already gone on for far all long. The truth was, she could identify with Brennan's feelings, as she too had felt the same way many times during her life before she got her job. Her sisters had been out in the world and had got jobs they loved, while she had to hang back and get her degree. "Do you ever get the feeling that all we do these days is fight?" She asked quietly, silently conceding defeat.

"You noticed that too, huh…?" Was Brennan's subdued response. It seemed he too was tired of their constant arguing. "I don't really even remember the last time we had fun with each other…"

The two of them thought over this point for a moment, genuinely horrified when neither of them could remember when they enjoyed being married to one another. It certainly wasn't through lack of love, as they had that in abundance. With everything that happened in their lives, there just seemed to be no room for happiness. "I don't want to have the kind of marriage where we don't even know why we're together." Phoebe admitted softly, "And I don't want to be this person that I've turned into over the past six months… Which is why I'm going to let you have this one."

Brennan looked up from the floor in surprise, his eyes wide, "What? Are you serious?"

"Yeah, we'll… Well, we'll find a way to make it work. We'll call it a monument to us changing back into the people we used to be. If this is what you want to do with your life, then who am I to stand in your-?" She was suddenly cut off when he wrapped his arms around her and lifted her into the air, catching her lips in an intense kiss as he spun her around, holding her close before gently lowering her back to the floor. "Wow, I should let you win arguments more often!"

"Well, actually…"

"I was kidding!"

* * *

"Goodnight, sweetie…" Paige murmured softly as she gently closed the door to Emma's room, leaving it slightly ajar so a crack of natural light from the hallway could get in and keep the little girl's fears at ease. It was a rather ironic fear for her, as her strongest power came from her ability to manipulate darkness and shadows. If anything, Emma should have thought of them as her friend, and not something to fear.

After glancing briefly into the next room to check on Melinda – who had been tucked in already –, the witchlighter slowly made her way down the stairs and took in the silence of the house. Aidan had left shortly before the girls' bedtime on an unknown errand, so until he returned, she had the house all to herself. She grinned, plopping down on the sofa and grabbing the remote, smiling at the thought of catching up with all the shows that she'd had to Tivo the past few weeks, before she spotted her husband's car pull into the driveway. With a small noise signifying her mild irritation, Paige dropped the remote back onto the couch and waited for the elemental to come in.

"Look what I have!" Aidan exclaimed, before Paige silenced him with a harsh shushing noise, "Look what I have…" He repeated in a whisper, holding up the brown paper bag and pulling a large looking bottle of champagne. "Surprise! I saw this when I was grocery shopping last week and thought it would be great for special occasions, so…" He trailed off when he saw the thunderous look on her face, "What? Why are you glaring at me?"

"Alcohol?" Paige questioned, scowling at him with an eyebrow rose, "Are you kidding me?"

Aidan frowned, looking at the bottle and realizing what she meant, laughing a little. "Aw, Paige, c'mon! Gimme a little credit, I have known and shared a bed with you for over six years after all. There's nothing but bubbles in this stuff. Completely non-alcoholic, but it looks like actual champagne, so I thought it would good for celebrating. Trust me; we could give an entire bottle of this to the kids if we wanted."

Paige laughed a little as he set the bottle down on the coffee table, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have doubted you." She said with a smile, before narrowing her eyes at him a little and biting her lip. "C'mon." She rose from the sofa, taking his hand in hers as they walked out of the living room. "I wanna show you something before we crack open the bottle of faux champagne!"

* * *

Paige gently took hold of the large brown sheet that was covering an object the wall of the garage, shooting her husband an apprehensive stare as he settled on the hood of her Volkswagen Beetle. Due to the light reflecting off his glasses, she couldn't see into his eyes, which made his mood particularly hard to read. "Okay, I haven't ever shown this to you because, well, there's never been a reason to, so don't think it's a big secret. And remember; just… think before you speak, alright?" Her face suddenly set like stone when he chuckled at her seriousness. "I mean it." She added, glaring a little.

Aidan took this sudden mood shift as a reason not to question or argue with his wife's words. "Alright, I'm sorry. I promise." He replied, giving her a soft smile as a piece offering.

Taking a deep breath, Paige pulled roughly at the sheet, bringing it off the canvas that was almost as big as the garage wall. The moment it was revealed, Aidan was stunned by the colour and vibrancy of the painting. It seemed like every single colour in the world had a place on the canvas. None of the original white could be seen. It had been completely covered by the artist. "Uh… Paige, I know it's customary to steal office supplies from your job, but don't you think you're taking it to the extreme?"

She smacked him on the arm as she leant on the hood of the car next to him, "This isn't something from the gallery! This is something from me. I painted this nearly twenty years ago… after my parents' funeral."

"Oh…"

"Yeah." Paige replied in a similar tone. "My Aunt Julie thought that art would be a good way to express my grief and anger without going out with my friends and falling into a downward spiral." She snorted with laughter, a fond smile creeping over her face. "And she was absolutely right. If I hadn't put my energy into something like this, I probably would have gone out, got drunk or high every night… or both. I never would have gone to college, never would have met my sisters, and never would have met you…" The witchlighter bumped shoulders with him affectionately, "In a way, this painting saved my life…" She smirked a little as he stared at the picture in deep concentration. "It's just a blob to you, isn't it?"

"I'm sorry." Aidan immediately apologized, "But hey, what do I know? I have a mathematical degree, not an artistic one, and I can't even draw a realistic stickman." He took her hand, pulling her up to her feet and guiding her forward to the painting, "And if it makes you feel any better, it's the most beautiful blob I've ever seen, especially now that I know the meaning behind it." The elemental put an arm around her shoulder, bending down a little to kiss the top of her head before turning back to the painting, "So, where do you want to put it?"

"Oh! I don't want to put it anywhere." Paige responded, staring at her work with an ethereal look in her eyes as she smiled softly. "I like the fact that only three people have ever seen it. Me, my aunt, and the person I care the most about in the entire world." She said, looking up at him with love.

"You forgot to include me." Aidan said with a cheeky grin, prompting Paige to smack him lightly in the abdomen as she too had a small chuckle to herself. "It seems a bit of a shame to hide if it means so much to you through."

"Nah, I prefer it that way. It's been in storage for most of the time since there was never any space for it wherever I lived, so I've just gotten used to the fact no one's gonna see it." With an instance of concentration, the large sheet suddenly fell victim to Paige's telekinesis and flew back up onto the painting gently as if it had never been removed. "It's just our little secret."

* * *

Pamela slowly stirred her steaming mug of coffee with a vacant stare into the dark abyss that lay inside the cup. She had been stirring for a full five minutes; losing herself in the hypnotic trance of the circular motion she was moving it in. Eventually, she realized what she was going and pulled the spoon out, catching her obscured refection on the round surface and taking a moment to inspect the scar on her face. It had healed considerably; leaving a faded red line down her face that she knew would never go away. She could carry it for the rest of her life.

She was taking her first sip as Keith reentered the apartment, putting his keys down on the counter and shrugging his jacket off his shoulders. "Wow…" He breathed, looking around. "I'm surprised that everything is still in one piece after I saw the look on your face when you came in." He said with a smile, seeing that there was a steaming pot of coffee on the stove and deciding to have some. "So, what was that all about? I take it that Gwen girl was carrying Dean's kid?"

"Wow, you're good." Pamela said sarcastically, lowering her coffee cup. "Was it the murderous stare I had towards Dean, or Trent coming in before me to warn Dean that tipped you off?" She growled, before instantly regretting her tone and words. "I'm sorry, it's just that I thought I had my brother pegged, you know? He's supposed to be the only person in my life that is simple. He doesn't have an agenda, he doesn't have secrets, and then I find out he's knocking girls up at parties he got drunk at. They're now hiding from me in Dean's room." She took another weary sip of coffee. "Yup, today's certainly been one of change."

"How so?"

"Well, I find out my little brother isn't so little anymore, I was actually friendly with Trent, I got a cat." She caught Keith's shocked expression at the last one, "Don't ask." She advised, "Oh, and I found out that you dumped Carmine because she was pissed at the fact you were spending so much time at my bedside when I was attacked my the witch hunter."

Keith nearly spat out his mouthful of coffee as Pamela smiled smugly at him from across the counter. He calmly placed his cup onto the counter and wiped his mouth a little. "Um… Well, it was just that she was angry that I was caring for a friend and I… well, I was gonna get shot of her anyway. She was far too clingy and generic. I like my women to have a little something that makes them stick out from the rest."

"I guess that's why you and I clicked so well…" Pamela said with a warm smile. Before slipping off the stool and standing. "Alright, I think I'm gonna go to bed. I'm really tired and my head is absolutely killing me. Oh…" She turned as she was about to disappear down the hallway. "If you see Nightshade, just stay away from her. She'll scratch the hell outta anyone who isn't me."

"Who's Nightshade?"

"My cat. I told you not to ask." Pamela replied, winking at him as she turned back towards her room. "Goodnight!"

"Goodnight…" He murmured back, looking down at his coffee with a small smile and laying it down on the counter. When he looked up, he jumped slightly at the cat that was suddenly staring at him from the back of the sofa, apparently marking its territory by pressing its paws into the couch and laying its scent into the furniture. Keith could only let out a small laugh at the whole situation as he turned to the sink to clean his mug with a fond grin.

_I love that girl._

* * *


	30. Darkness There

Watch out for the Buffy and Supernatural references. ;)

**Darkness There…**

"I can't see a thing!"

"Ow! Watch where you're waving your damn hand!"

"Shut up! I'm trying to get the… Aha! Here it is."

There was a small tinkering sound of glass shattering, followed by a flash, before an amazing burst of pure white light flew up from the ground and high above the Charmed Ones' heads, illuminating the area that their spell had taken them to. It had been risky to use a spell, but since Paige had had no idea where they were going, orbing randomly to try and get to this place could have buried them miles beneath the earth.

"Oh, my God…" Piper breathed, taking her first few cautious steps forward and looking around in awe.

Apart from the hovering source of light above them, everything else was blanketed in darkness. The ceiling of this gigantic cavern stretched further than her eyes could see, while the massive ravine to the side of the large cliff they were standing on seemed to go down to centre of the Earth, perhaps to Hell itself. But it wasn't the sheer size of the area that impressed Piper, it was something else entirely.

A large gap ran up the side of the wall, vanishing upwards into the darkness just like the ceiling, it seemed to be a doorway of some kind. Her suspicions where concreted when she noticed two massive demonic creatures on either side of the gap, as if they were a marker of how important this cavern was. They had been masterfully carved out of the rock, down to the threatening looking goat horns protruding from the top of their skulls, to the snake-like tongues slithering out of their gaping mouths. This was a monument to evil itself.

"Okay, I know this is going to sound weird, but… why did the demons ever abandon this place? I mean, I'm getting the willies from just standing here looking around." Piper cast her eyes upwards once again to the invisible ceiling that must have been miles above them. "I'm gonna say it; this is a demonic masterpiece!"

Paige was looking in the completely opposite direction from her eldest sister, spotting a form of ancient writing that was scribed all over the ground. It was a language that she had never seen before, which after a decade as a witch, was extremely rare. "This place looks to be from evil's golden age. It's better known as the Crimson Era."

Phoebe frowned at this, something in her memory jumping to life. "Wait, the Crimson Era…? I've seen that in the book a few times under some demon entries, and by the sounds of things, the last thing we would want is to go up against a demon from that time."

Her younger sister smirked in amusement, having studied this fascinating subject during her spell of unemployment. "No kidding. Evil's not one of those things that has gotten better with age, neither is the side of good. Both of them are weakened forms of what they used to be… Anyway, the Crimson Era was the time where demons thought life couldn't get any better. They had Good on the run, and the first ever Source had been coronated, so they were finally under strong leadership. It was a great time if you were evil."

"What happened?"

"Demons of course." Paige said with a bit of amusement as she got a flashlight out of the bag she was carrying, "There's always one that wants the power for himself. So, one of these demons gained a following and waged war against the Source and his demons. And by the looks of things…" She moved the light from the instrument in her hand around, looking at the ancient architecture of the entrance and how it was covered in hundreds of scorch marks and large chunks missing from the wall. "The last battle was fought here."

"So… does that mean that this place is the Source's palace?" Piper asked, taking a flashlight from her youngest sister before snorting out a laugh, "Boy, the Source we knew sure traded up. A dingy, badly lit cave instead of a demonic palace, it's an easy choice." She said sarcastically, examining the damage that run high up the walls. "Although, demons back then must have had terrible aim, I mean, how did scorch marks get all the way up there?"

"I'm guessing demons weren't so human-like back then." Phoebe said darkly, now also armed with a flashlight as she looked at the writing on the ground. "Most of them could probably fly above the battle, and cause all those holes in the wall with a fist… And rip apart one another with their teeth." She added quietly, "C'mon, let's go. The sooner we follow up on my premonition, the sooner we can leave." Her sisters agreed; beginning to move forward as Phoebe gave one last sweep of the immediate area. "So many died here…"

The three of them trekked towards the large gap in the wall; silently thinking that this gateway was exactly how they pictured the gateway to Hell would look like. They knew that if the current Underworld was like this, then they wouldn't be so willing to delve into its caverns on a weekly basis to chase down a demon. It made them wonder if their side had ever had a realm this grand. For once in their careers as witches, they felt that the Power of Three wouldn't be enough for anything that came out of these caves.

"Ah!" Phoebe gasped as she felt something brush by her shoulder, instantly making her sisters stop in their tracks and turn around, causing Paige's flashlight to illuminate her sister and catch a wisp of inky darkness trail over the middle Charmed One's body and coiling around her midsection. A shadow demon. "Piper! Blow it up!"

"It's a shadow! If I try to blast it, I'll hit you instead." Piper shouted back.

"Well, do something!"

Paige, thinking fast, looked up towards the giant ball of light that had been hovering above them this entire time. It seemed to be the only thing that was stopping the shadow demon from devouring Phoebe entirely. "Light!" She called, throwing her arm into the air and bringing the light downwards via a cloud of orbs. It cast a blinding glow over the witch, a wail of pain piercing the dark silence as the demon retreated from them and back into the shadows.

"Okay…" Paige breathed, casting the light back up into the air, but keeping it lower down this time. "That was a close one."

"Uh… guys?" Piper murmured quietly, staring upwards with wide, fearful eyes. "Look up, but do _not_ point your flashlights up."

The younger Halliwell siblings did as they were told; their expression matching Piper's when they saw what was up there. It looked as if the entire non-ceiling was alive with hundreds of shadow demons, crawling over one another due to the lack of space and the size of their numbers. The Charmed Ones froze when all of the demons stopped moving, and suddenly rained down from the ceiling towards them, as if they were waging war. "Paige, orb us outta here!" Phoebe shrieked, looking towards the legion of shadows that was falling on them.

"No, wait! I have an idea!" Piper announced, "Turn off your flashlights!" She shouted. They didn't need to be told twice, and when Phoebe couldn't find the switch on hers, she just threw it down on the ground, smashing it to pieces and destroying it. Piper then flicked out her hands at the large ball of light above them, causing it to burst into a spray of golden sparks as it blew up into nothing, leaving the three witches in darkness once again.

"What the hell was the point in that?" Phoebe screamed, crouching a little from the threat if raining shadow demons.

"Shadow demons can only come into our plane and attack by using shadows as a portal. If there's no light to cast a shadow, they get thrown back into their plane. I read it in the Book of Shadows entry." Piper responded calmly, being nothing but a disembodied voice to her sisters due to the dark. "Although there's one thing I don't know… how are we supposed to see now? I mean, if we conjure a light, the demons will come back."

A rhyme from Paige was the response, "…I call upon the Power of Three, so even in darkness, we may see."

Piper smirked as the hand that she had been waving in front of her face suddenly came into view in a green hue, along with everything else in her line of vision, including her sisters, who too seemed to be realizing that they could see. "A night vision spell…Good thinking!"

They continued their journey into the palace, finding it to be nothing more than a ruin, a testament to a far more powerful evil. Large statues of generic demonic creatures had either been completely toppled, heavily damaged, or totally destroyed, leaving only the pedestal where they once stood. The Charmed Ones where thankful that this area seemed to have a visible ceiling, as it brought them an uneasy comfort to know that this space had limits.

Eventually, the Wiccan trio reached the back of the palace where a grand throne sat atop a slightly raised plateau. It was exactly what you would expect for the seat of a demonic king; devil heads at the end of each armrest, skull carvings lining the edge of the back, and a giant serpent head at the top, staring down at who ever was in front of the throne with its forked tongue protruding dangerously from its mouth.

"Alright, in my premonition, when Diam and Tyola chanted something in front of this throne, it split in two and revealed a passageway behind it." Phoebe said, putting a hand on the armrest of the royal seat and turning to her sisters. "So, I'm thinking that if they both needed to chant, it probably requires the Power of Three."

"Do you know what they chanted?" Piper asked.

"… I didn't recognize the language, but I wrote it down in phonetics, so I hope that's good enough." Phoebe said, pulling out a piece of paper from her back pocket and urging her sisters to stand around so she could take their hands and tap into their power as she chanted the spell. As Piper and Paige held the spell in front of her, she began to chant in a language that vaguely resembled Latin, yet every syllable made Phoebe sound like a demon growling.

She finished, and to the surprise of both her sisters, the throne split into two pieces, moving away from one another with a menacing scraping noise and revealing a narrow stairway that led downwards. The three of them voiced their own disappointment of going down even further, glaring at the foreboding passage. But it was Piper who summed up their feelings perfectly.

"Figures that we have to go down even _further_!"

* * *

Tyola spun around, scanning the dark room for the source of the noise that she had heard. "Did you hear that?" She asked her partner. She could have sworn that she had heard a voice from the steps that led into this room.

"Hear what?" Diam asked in a bored tone as he circled the prize that they had come here to claim, his cold, grey eyes staring at it hungrily.

"Nothing… I guess."

This entire cavern had been made to hold something precious. Instead of the usual rough, rocky surface the Underworld was made of, it seemed that these walls were made of solid marble that had been carved masterfully into a dome. The floor was also made of the hard substance, although it was barely clear due to the only source of light being a faint red glow coming from their treasure. A deep crimson orb sat atop a stone pedestal in the centre of the room, giving off a gentle yet foreboding light. It looked like you could see into the Earth's core from this object, as within the glass, flames pulsed from the middle and pushed against the impregnable outer shell. With its appearance, and the feeling it gave off, one to be forgiven for thinking that it held the entire world's evil.

"We should just smash it, here and now." Tyola growled, staring at the sphere with nothing but pure hatred. "If we do that, all of this will be over and our master will be free once again."

"… Or it could react violently to any sort of attack and kill us." Diam offered smoothly, shaking his head at the notion of such a blunt maneuver. "No, we're dealing with magic that's even older than us, we have no idea what would happen if we even touched the Devil's Eye. For all we know, the first Source placed a powerful hex on it to prevent it from being stolen."

"You're giving demons too much credit." Tyola replied, slowly walking towards the coveted item and considering it with a curious expression. "If there's one thing they're known for, it's their pride. The Source probably thought that no one would ever figure out how to get into this crypt, let alone get close enough to even attempt entry." She shook her head in disgust. "Idiotic beings…" The echoing of footsteps caught her attention, and she looked around just in time to see the Charmed Ones file out of the staircase. "Diam!"

Her partner looked up from the Devil's Eye, his eyes widening as the witches took an attack stance. Thanking fast, he threw out his arm, using the power he had stolen from Paige to send Piper hurtling across the room, landing hard and skidding along the marble floor before smacking her head off the wall. "You hold them off, I'll work on this." He stated calmly, going back to carefully retrieving the artifact from the pedestal.

The sisters split up. Paige went across to Piper, falling to her knees and holding her hands out over the eldest witch's head and starting the healing process with a gentle golden glow flowing from her palms. Phoebe, on the other hand, moved towards the centre of the room to fend off the two beings that had attacked her sister. "Going somewhere?" Tyola growled with a cocky smile.

"Yeah. Right through you." Phoebe said back with a sweet smile, a psionic blast bursting to life above her eyes and providing a small source of light before flying towards Tyola's head, sending her flying across the room, clutching her head as she fell to the smooth floor with a thud. She next ran towards her next target, levitating into the air and pummeling her feet into Diam's chest repeatedly before delivering one final assault and sending him too to the floor.

As she was coming down from the air, Phoebe was struck by a blinding stream of light that had come from Tyola's fingers as she lay on the ground. It had to have been the power she had copied from Lexa during Faith's birth. The middle Charmed One was thrown towards her sisters, hitting them like a bowling ball to skittles and sending them back to the floor. Both sides were even.

They were beginning to recover when a column of shimmers began to appear next to the pedestal, depositing a short beggar-looking demon into the room. His small, greedy eyes quickly took a look around at the people in the room, before he snatched the Devil's Eye into his grubby palms and dropped it into a satchel that hung from his shoulder and lay at his waist, taking the source of light from the room as the artifact was pocketed, "Gotcha…" He whispered excitedly, before shimmering away in haste and leaving the Charmed Ones to gawk at the point where he once stood.

* * *

Annabelle stared into the potion pot with a glimmer of hope in her eyes as the smoke began to clear. That same glimmer was snuffed when all she saw were the burnt out remains of the concoction she had mixed. "Okay, normally, I rate myself as a pretty patient person, but we've been trying this for months! Can't you do anything else but look for signals?" She snapped at Emma, who had also been watching the failed divination.

"Look, just calm down. The ether's a pretty big place. Maybe it's just taking it's time to find the signal." Emma replied, gently closing the Book of Shadows over and putting it back onto its altar. "And no, we can't do anything else. You've searched high and low for the last eleven years and haven't found anything, so now we're doing things my way." Sensing her friend's frustration, she tried to calm her, "Look, I would love to send a beacon into the cosmos, but that kind of thing is complicated without the Power of Three and it requires us to have the book with us, and since only the Charmed Ones can take it out of the house…"

"Then why don't we just do it from here?" Annabelle asked, frowning and holding her arms outwards, presenting the space around her. "This is Halliwell Manor. If we don't have the materials we need here, then I'm pretty sure nowhere will."

"Our location is exactly why we can't do it." Emma said flatly, starting to tidy up the potion ingredients. "This is Halliwell Manor. It sits on top of a spiritual nexus. If we broadcast any kind of powerful magic from here, demons would be all over us in seconds. Trust me; there are certain demons that sit around, waiting to sense things like that."

"I'm pretty sure that we could handle anything that came in here looking for a fight." Annabelle said confidently, folding her arms.

"Don't be so sure." Emma warned sagely, putting the cork into the top of a bottle that contained the ashes of a Manticore.

Distant voices echoed in the room as a cloud of orbs began to materialize. Emma rolled her eyes, recognizing the faint shouts of arguing in the ether as they got even stronger with the orbs. Eventually, the Charmed Ones were left standing where the light had previously stood, each of them breaking hands with one another immediately to continue their heated bickering.

"Don't you dare blame me for this!" Paige spat at Phoebe as the middle Charmed One lowered herself onto the sofa while Piper moved towards the book. "I have no control over how long healing takes. Piper had a serious head injury. Would you rather she had slipped into a coma while I helped you make bitchy remarks to the enemy?"

"Oh, well, I'm sorry for trying to stop Diam and Tyola from getting something that could destroy us in the blink of an eye. And I would have been successful if you had moved a little quicker. That's all I'm saying!" Phoebe snapped back, deciding to stand as she didn't like how her baby sister was looking down on her.

"This hasn't got anything to do with me. If anyone should get the blame, it's Piper."

"What?" Piper shrieked, slamming the Book of Shadows shut and striding into the argument. "How the hell am I to blame? Last time I checked, one of my powers wasn't the ability to fight while unconscious." She retorted, her jaw clenching with anger as she finished. "That's _your_ power." She added with a triumphant smirk.

"Are you kidding me?" Paige sneered, placing a hand on her hip. "Diam's had my power for around a year. You've had your powers for nearly a decade and half! If you can't use your powers quickly after all this time, then maybe you should get your reflexes checked out. Ow!" She suddenly gasped as Piper pinched a portion of the skin on her arm. "What the hell was _that_ for?"

"Paige…" Piper started off in a patronizing tone, "You've had that arm for nearly thirty four years. If you can't move it quickly after all this time, then maybe you should get your reflexes checked." She said, imitating her youngest sister's tone of voice.

"Why, you…"

"Alright!" Emma suddenly shouted, stepping into the circle the Charmed Ones had created and gently pushing them back from another, her head spinning as she shot shocked looks at all of them. "What the hell has gotten into the three of you? I know losing sucks but I've never seen you go at each other like that before. I take it things didn't go too well down there?"

"_No!_" All three witches shouted at the same time, glaring heatedly at each other before frowning a little at the vicious attitude they all seemed to suddenly have. "Huh…" Phoebe said, giving her sisters a cocked eyebrow. "Something tells me we brought a little evil back with us."

"You think this is a side effect from being in the Deep Underworld?" Paige asked, also snapping out of her enraged state. She was about to continue, when her cellphone began to ring inside her jean pocket. Taking it out and flipping it open, the witchlighter groaned at the name on the screen. "Hello?" She paused as the person on the other line spoke. "Oh, for God's sake! So this is why you guys are practically a day late?" Another pause. "No, I didn't! Why the hell would I want the paintings delivered at eleven at night instead of in the morning? Hold on." She took the phone from ear, "Work related mishap. Gimme a few minutes." She said, walking from the room and onto the landing outside.

Piper went back towards the book with a sigh, "Leo!" She called out tiredly as she opened the tome once again to search for the demon that had thwarted both them and their enemy. As she was flipping, she realized that her husband still hadn't appeared after around thirty seconds. "Leo, c'mon, I don't care if you're doing something with the Elders. We need you!"

It was this plea that made the Elder appear in a swarm of orbs, materializing at her side. "What is it? Did you get the Devil's Eye?" He asked anxiously, looking around the room for any signs of the artifact.

"Nope." Piper replied as she continued to look through the book.

His eyes widened in fear. "So Diam and Tyola have it?"

"Nope."

Leo frowned in confusion. "Then who _does_ have it?"

His wife's nostrils flared as she turned the page, spotting the demon that had got past them. "He does." She growled; stabbing the page with her finger as Phoebe walked over to her side to inspect the picture and the information that came with it. Her shoulders instantly drooped when she saw what was on the page.

"We got the Devil's Eye taken from right under us by a scavenger demon?" She voiced her disbelief out loud, inspecting the description. "They're about as low level as you can get!"

* * *

Diam watched with minimum interest as another one of the large tables in the Great Hall of Magic School was obliterated by a barrel of lightning. It had came shooting from his companion's hand, reducing the piece of furniture into a pile of smoldering wood and sending all the books that lay on top of it into the air in a flurry of paper. "If it ends up that we needed one of those books, you're going to be the one that has to find all the pages." He warned calmly, unfazed by Tyola's temper.

The raging being in question brought her arm back to her side, voltage still coiling around her wrist before dissipating completely. It seemed that she was about to raise her other arm to destroy something else, but she stopped herself and took a breath. "Alright, it's out of my system. Now, how about we hunt down that thieving weasel of a demon and flay him? Yeah, let's flay him. I'm in a flaying mood. How about you, Diam?"

"Always." He said with a sick smile, "But why don't we save the extravagant torture techniques for the Charmed Ones. Who, thanks to your little venting session, are probably well ahead of us in trying to find that demon. So how about we take a different approach?"

Tyola frowned in interest, folding her arms with a smirk, "Alright, you've got me intrigued. What are you suggesting?"

"Well…" He began, getting up from the sofa that he had been lounging in during Tyola's rampage and going towards the shelves that carried an array of books. "I seriously doubt that even their Book of Shadows has enough knowledge on magic as old as the Devil's Eye to help them. They would need the books that we have here to make any actual progress. That's where we have the upper hand…"

"So what are you suggesting? That we take the peaceful option instead of tearing the Underworld apart and try to find a way to summon the Devil's Eye to us from here?" Tyola asked, shocked when he nodded, "Oh, c'mon, Diam. We both know how it worked all those years ago. The Elders kept all the knowledge about the Devil's Eye, and the Source kept all the information about the Angel's Whisper. We can't just spit it out a few verses in a demonic tongue and expect it to appear to us."

"Look around." He said, presenting the many shelves full of books to her, "We're in Magic School. This place used to be the epicenter of good magic before it destroyed in the battle with Satanos two and a half years ago." Diam began to take the books from their shelves, inspecting their covers and flicking through the first pages, before throwing them across the room when they didn't have what he needed. "If the secrets of the Devil's Eye are anywhere, it's here."

"No, if the secrets are anywhere, they're in the heavens with the Elders." Tyola sighed with frustration when Diam didn't even look up from the book he was inspecting. "Whatever." She snapped, "You can sit here and read while I get off my ass and do something." She snarled, turning on her heel, her bushy brown hair flying behind her as she strode across the room, vanishing in a swirl of particles that shot for the broken window.

"Suit yourself."

* * *

Len tightly held on to the pouch that hung at his hip as he walked through the centre of the demonic market. His eyes darted from one demon to another as they briefly glanced at him before going back to their conversations. He knew that they could sense the great power that was around them, but when they only saw a low level scavenger demon in the spot they thought the energy was coming from, they lost interest. Once they learned what he had in this pouch, they would regret underestimating him.

Grateful for the cover of the scavengers' base, Len headed inside, surveying his follow demons with a cocky stare as they too could feel the power emanating from his bag as he stepped past them, heading towards the thick curtain that separated the main room from their leader's lair. He was a fearful creature, and even Len, one of the most skilled scavenger demons of their brethren, had never seen his face. He was secretly hoping that bringing his master a treasure like this would make him reveal his face.

The leading demon in question was sitting in the middle of the smoky room, the din of the market now heavily muffled in this place and acting as a haven from the bustle of the outside. He was wearing a large black cloak that covered his face and splayed out over the ground around him, completely concealing the cushion on which he sat upon within the circle of candles. "What have you brought me this time?" He asked in a gruff voice, "A Key of Solomon? Another urn of Osiris? The magic of a first born witch, perhaps? I was about to suggest a dragon egg, but I doubt you'd get close enough to one of those." He chuckled, before spluttering into a coughing fit that was very revealing of his age.

"No." Len replied smugly. Today, he had the patience for his master's patronizing jibes, as he knew he would be eating his words very soon. "I've brought you something that is priceless, there's only one in existence." He reached into his bag and pulled out his bounty, setting a red glow around the room immediately, "It is the Devil's Eye!" He presented it proudly, looking down into its fiery core. "I had to thwart the Charmed Ones to get it, but-,"

He was cut off when his master suddenly flew at him in a plume of black smoke, shoving him up against the wall before reappearing in front of him. "You fool!" The cloaked being hissed, pressing his forearm into his servant's throat. "Do you have any idea what you've stolen? The witches should be the least of your concerns right now! You've angered a far greater power!"

"You're damn right he has."

Both demons looked towards the curtain entrance of the room to see Tyola standing in the doorway, smoke billowing in from the main room. She had slaughtered the rest of the scavenger demons within seconds. With a sneer, she casually flicked out her wrist, an energy ball hurtling from her palm at an amazing speed and reducing Len's master into a smoking pile of ash instantly. "Give me the Eye…" She growled, another energy ball bursting to life in her hand as a primary warning about what would happen if he didn't comply.

Tyola was about to throw the energy ball when a cloud of orbs that was appearing behind the demon caught her attention, "Damnit…" She snarled, watching the Charmed Ones fully materialize with a glare, before realizing that they would be able to take care of the problem for her. She watched with delight when each of them threw a potion at Len's back. Smoke began to rise over his shoulder, and he turned around to his attackers, revealing his entire back was now on fire as the combined potions began to take effect…

Before completely fizzling out.

The Devil's Eye in Len's hand glowed an angry orange as the fire faded away, along with the demon's wound. The evil creature smirked and threw out his free hand, a dart of fire flying from his fingers and striking Phoebe in the shoulder, sending the Charmed One to the floor, clutching the burnt and bleeding skin underneath her now ruined blouse.

Seeing that her sister's injury was nowhere near a fatal, Paige decided to go with the greater good option and, getting up from her kneeling position at Phoebe's side, violently swung her arm outwards in Tyola's direction, sweeping her enemy up in a telekinetic force that sent her flying across the room, landing roughly on the ground with a thud. "Piper, the Eye!" She shouted, advancing on Tyola while she was still trying to recover.

Piper growled in frustration at being left with this job. Her powers weren't suited to harmlessly retrieving something from a slippery demon's hands. Now, if she had to destroy the artifact, she could do that with hardly any effort at all. Choosing the best form of action, the eldest Charmed One began to fade way from view as her invisibility power consumed her. The witch's disappearance instantly made Len even more edgy than usual, his small eyes darting around the room from place to place. He knew that the wise thing to do was to shimmer out, but surviving the Charmed Ones' potion onslaught had bolstered his courage. He was going to stay and fight.

Calming down, Len began to try and focus on the quieter sounds in the room so he could detect the witch's footsteps. Hearing something, he raised one hand away from the Devil's Eye and threw it out towards where he believed Piper was. A fire dart burst from his palm, before suddenly exploding into a shower of sparks halfway towards its target due to Piper's powers. He had definitely been right.

Suddenly, the Devil's Eye was wrenched from his hands by an invisible force. With wide, fearful eyes, he watched the artifact float in the air for a few seconds, before it gave off a fierce white glow. Piper instantly reemerged in the room, her eyes scrunched up tightly and her teeth bared. It looked like just holding the object was causing her extreme pain. With an agonizing scream, Piper tried to stay her thrashing, succeeding for just a few moments in which an unbelievable amount of energy was released from the Devil's Eye in the form of a crimson beam.

Tyola, currently fighting with Paige, had no time to prepare herself for the attack. The energy struck her in the side, sending her through the stone wall of the building at a phenomenal speed and flying into the air above the market. They couldn't even see where she had landed, but the residual energy from the beam had kept going past her and into the market, vanquishing several demons in the process and causing widespread panic almost instantly.

"Devil's Eye!" Paige screamed, calling for the object in the hopes of saving her sister from the deadly effects touching it had brought. Nothing happened. It didn't want to leave until it destroyed the Charmed One.

Ironically, it was Len that saved her. With a triumphant grin, he snatched the artifact back from her, letting Piper collapse to the floor unconscious with the palms of her hands severely burned. He was about to shimmer out, when Phoebe rose to her feet, flinging a vial filled with a light blue liquid at his feet. The demon prepared himself for the pain from an attempted vanquish, but to his pleasant surprise, it never came. "See you around," He said, arrogance dripping from his voice as he vanished from the ruins of the battle in a flurry of shimmers.

* * *

"Does it hurt?" Aidan asked softly as he held his hands over Piper's, serene aquamarine light pouring from his palms and slowly beginning to heal the severe burns that for some reason, only his powers could remedy. Pamela sat next to her aunt, cringing at the charred redness that was in place of the witch's skin.

"Nasty…" She whispered as the skin began to heal beneath the glow.

Ignoring her niece, Piper groaned tiredly in response as she flopped back in the sofa she was sitting on, still keeping her hands out underneath the blue light. "No… not really." She said, answering Aidan's question. "Actually, I don't even feel it." She replied calmly, scrunching up her eyes in pain as she resisted the urge to rub her temples. "My head's killing me though…"

"I'm not surprised you don't feel anything." Aidan said darkly, shaking his head at the severity of the burns on his sister in law's hands. "These are third degree burns, verging on forth. All the nerves in your hands were incinerated by the heat… There you go." He took his hands away as the healing process finished, leaving Piper's hands as good as new.

"What were you saying about your head?" Leo asked with a curious frown as he continued to heal Phoebe's shoulder as she stood next to the potion pot in the centre of the attic, throwing in ingredients with the arm that wasn't being healed while Emma read out what she had to use from the Book of Shadows.

Piper's mouth was agape as she tried to muster the right words to sum up what she was feeling. "… It was weird. It was like I was like my whole body was on fire, and I tried to scream, but I couldn't… Evil was just everywhere! Around my throat, around my eyes… If that demon hadn't pulled it out of my hands, I probably would have died."

"It must be some kind of defense mechanism against any good beings touching it…" Phoebe sneered, thanking her brother in law for his healing in the form of a kind smile before going back to the copper bowl and resuming the potion brewing.

"But I don't get it. If the magical community didn't want these artifacts used all those years ago, surely demons are the biggest suspects for breaking that rule. Shouldn't the rule work the other way?" Emma asked, seeing that Phoebe had finished the potion and now deciding to flip the pages in the book to the entry on the Devil's Eye.

Leo shrugged in response, "That's the way it _should_ work, but each side made their own instruments. The demons obviously made theirs so that the next demon that wanted to take the Devil's Eye could use it to overthrow the balance between good and evil and make evil supreme. You know demons. They always want to be holding all the cards."

"Alright! That's it!" Pamela snapped, rising from the sofa so fast that she startled Piper. "Would someone please explain to me what the hell this Devil's Eye is? Are we dealing with the actual eyeball of a demon? Because if so, I really sympathize with you for having the stones to touch it." She said, briefly turning around to look at her aunt before turning back around.

"Ready the entry." Emma said curtly, turning the Book of Shadows in the young witch's direction on the table. "Once you're done, you may want to look on a few pages. There's a guide on how not to make a scene when you want information." This remark earned her a playful smack on the arm as Pamela placed her hands at the side of the tome and leant over the table, beginning to read.

_Diabolus Oculus_

_An ancient demonic instrument designed to channel and harness colossal amounts of malevolent energy. Diabolus Oculus was created approximately three and a half millennia ago during the war against the Hollow when all magic was threatened. It was used in the final battle against it and its two servants. It was half of the grand power that was used to banish this world's most destructive force, before it too was banished by the demons, condemned to reside beneath the Source's palace for eternity. The Hollow's two servants were sealed away shortly after by a different force, but have began to resurface in the past five hundred years. Also see elemental guardians and Angelus Barba._

"So basically, to put it in lamens terms, it's a ball that contains a lot of evil energy?" Pamela asked, looking down at the picture that had been magically inserted into the book after the Charmed Ones had seen what the object looked like. She frowned darkly at it, getting an unpleasant shiver down her spine just from looking at an illustration of the demonical tool. Spooked by the sudden chill, she lifted her hands from the table quickly, apparently quickly enough to set off Emma's emotionally inquisitive nature.

"You okay?" She asked with a frown of her own.

"Yeah… fine. It's alright, I'm okay." She said, putting on her best kind smile before turning back to the conversation as Paige walked into the room.

"Alright, the girls are settled in downstairs." She told Aidan, folding her arms and taking a look around the attic to see if she had missed anything during her absence. "I left Brennan down there on kid duty. They're all asleep, so he shouldn't have too much trouble with them." She turned to the rest of the group, raising her eyebrows questioningly, "How are things going up here?"

"Well, I'm putting together the ritual that will hone in on the tracking aura I put on the demon with that potion, so we should have a location pretty soon." Phoebe replied, sprinkling a powdery substance into the pot and flinching with surprise when it blew up into a cloud of white smoke.

"But what are you guys going to do after you find him?" Aidan, asked standing up from his kneeling position at the couch and folding his arms with a curious frown. "I mean, you said that the Devil's Eye has made this demon practically invincible, so how are you going to stop him, not to mention get the artifact back?"

"The keyword there is 'practically'." Piper said firmly, also rising from the sofa and walking across the room towards an old oak dresser, pulling out drawer after drawer and rifling through the contents as she spoke. "He's only had the thing for a few hours, he can't be completely unstoppable yet. We should be able to vanquish him with the Power of Three." She smiled when she discovered a small wooden box, opening it to reveal five coal black chunks of dark matter. "Perfect."

"If you're doing that, then use the spell you wrote to vanquish the Source." Emma interjected, flipping through the pages in the book to the correct entry and smiling when she found it. "It calls upon your entire Wiccan line. Combine that with the Power of Three, and your chances of vanquishing him are even better." Her smile turned into a frown as she realized something, "Hey… since you guys can't destroy it, where are you going to send it? I mean, you can't keep it. You'll be under constant attack."

"Let's just focus on getting the Devil's Eye back for now." Leo said, flatly answering the question. "When I left the other Elders, they were discussing about how to deal with its banishment, so hopefully they'll have an answer by the time we get the damn thing back." He said with a hint of anger, displeased that his fellow angelic beings were calmly conferring in the heavens while his family was in grave danger. He looked over, seeing a swarm of particles begin to coalesce on the other side of the table, forming Annabelle quicker than usual. Even she must have known the severity of the situation. "Where were you?"

"Getting a little extra help." She replied with a similar snappy tone, holding up the aged book in her hands. "This is a Key of Solomon. Think of it as a Book of Shadows from ancient times." She said, putting it down and opening up the tome to a marked page. "I got off these two demon hunters a few years back, but I've never used it. There's a ton of stuff about the Devil's Eye."

"Thanks." Phoebe said politely, frowning at the text on the page and glancing up at Annabelle warily, "Um… It's all in Latin."

"Like I said, think of it as a Book of Shadows from _ancient_ times." The blonde replied with a bashful expression on her face, shrugging her shoulders before looking into the potion pot. "So, is the locating ritual ready?"

"Pretty much." Emma replied, throwing in the seed of a rose for good measure before wiping her palms together and brushing them on her pants. "Are you guys ready to follow the signal?"

Piper bit her lip as she looked down at the box of dark matter, walking into the middle of the room where the conversation seemed to be centered. "… I'm not really sure whether or not this is a good idea." She admitted, looking at both of her sisters. "I mean, we're gonna be chasing a near invincible demon into the Underworld, so we don't have the home court advantage, and there will probably be demons tracking the Devil's Eye too. We won't even get to use the element of surprise."

"Do you have any better ideas?" Phoebe asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Actually…" Piper smirked a little, glancing over to Paige and pursing her lips as she properly formed her plan. "I do."

* * *

Len's face contorted into one of ecstasy as the powers of another demon he had just vanquished entered his body. The dark blue glow had floated in the air for a few moments, before flowing into him and imbuing him with a new range of powers. After barely escaping the battle at the market, he had sought out protection from some of the stronger demons, but even they refused to help him after hearing about his situation. He only had himself to rely on.

"Biting the hand that feeds you? Classy!"

Len narrowed his eyes in anger. He recognized that voice. And while he had only heard that voice for the first time a few hours ago, he had known of its owner for years. Turning around slowly, he found that, to his pleasant surprise, he was face to face with the youngest Charmed One with no sign of her sisters being there to back her up. But after the invisibility trick the eldest had pulled at the market, Len remained on guard.

"You want to try taking me on by yourself, witch?" He spat cockily, "Because it just so happens I recently acquired a darklighter crossbow, so you may want to make yourself scarce before I'm compelled to use it." He warned, going to turn around and spare the lone witch's life, until he heard an arrogant cackle echo through the entire chamber.

"Oh, please!" Paige bellowed after a bout of laughter, "Do you seriously expect me to be intimidated by a pathetic base level demon who just happens to have acquired a heavy dose of armour?" She said, smirking and shaking her head as she walked towards him. "See, while that little sphere in your pocket made you a little more resistant to a vanquish, it didn't exactly give you the power you truly wanted, did it? Deep down, you're still a mere scavenger demon who feeds off the leftovers of those who can actually fight."

Len sneered at the witch, who had now walked so close to him that he could see the clear brown tint in her eyes. "I could kill you all if I wanted to. I _will_ kill you all…"

Paige let out a snort of amusement, going even closer to Len with still a cocky expression on her face. "Bring it on." She challenged firmly, before vanishing in a flare of crimson light and leaving Len to grasp at the area in which her neck had once been.

* * *

Paige's eyes flashed open and she took in a deep breath as her real body woke up from projecting her astral form to where the locating ritual had found the demon. Aidan had been kneeling beside her, and was quick to pull her to feet, knowing what the plan was. "I take it you pissed him off enough?" He said with an amused smile, knowing that he hardly even had to ask.

"Of course!" She said enthusiastically, grinning inanely at her husband before going off to join her sisters at the partially constructed dark matter cage that had been created in the centre of the attic, over the pentacle that was normally hidden by a large circular rug.

"That's my girl." Aidan murmured to himself, before standing back and assuming waiting with the rest of the spectators.

The three Charmed Ones stood at different sides of the five points, Piper anxiously rolling the final piece of black matter in her hands as she waited for the demon to appear so she could complete the trap. They all stood there for a few seconds, beginning to think that perhaps the demon had been smart enough to see through their sister's provoking and had decided it was best to stay well away from the Manor. Their thoughts were quashed when Len appeared in the centre of the pentacle, his jaw clenched with rage as he stared at the witch that had angered him. He was about to raise his arm to attack, when he realized what he had to shimmered into. It was too late. Piper had already placed the dark matter, and he was now trapped by the five blood red bolts of energy around him.

"Prudence, Penelope, Patricia, Melinda…" Piper chanted softly.

"Astrid, Helena, Laura, and Grace…" Phoebe rhymed off slightly louder as wisps of golden light bled through the ceiling, their ancestors coming to their aid.

"Halliwell witches, stand strong beside us…" Paige said loudly, smiling when the all the streams of glistening energy began to swirl around their target, causing him great pain by the sounds of his screams.

They united on the final line of the spell, hoping to seal the demon's fate. "Vanquish this evil from time and space!"

The Charmed Ones took it as a sign of kindness from their ancestors, and a sign of their experience as witches, that this vanquish was one of their cleaner ones. The moment they finished the spell, Len was consumed in nova like explosion that sent a wave of great heat through the room, shockwaves pulsed from the middle of the pentagram and were luckily contained by the dark matter cage. He had been vanquished, leaving the Devil's Eye sitting perfectly in the centre of the now defunct pentacle.

"We did it…" Paige breathed, before her triumph turned to confusion, then horror, when the Devil's Eye was suddenly began to fade away in a swathe of pale blue light. Neither of her sisters could do anything to stop this, and could only watch as the artifact that they had been fighting all night for vanished from their grasp.

* * *

"It worked." Tyola marveled at the Devil's Eye that had just appeared on one of the few tables that were still in one piece in the Great Hall. She waved her hand over it, smirking with delight when she could feel the power that was binding her master, and how it was now in their mercy. "Okay, so how shall we do it? It's a shame we can't really flay an inanimate object." She said; genuine sadness in her voice as Diam pulled away from the book he used to summon the object.

"Relax." He said coolly. "It said in that book that we need to destroy with a ritual. It shouldn't take long to…" He trailed off, frowning when the Devil's Eye began to give a pale light, before a tornado of white, silvery lights began to spin around it. His eyes widened in anger and fear when he realized what was happening. After a year and a half of dealing with them, Diam had come to recognize their magic by now. "The witches!"

* * *

"Addo nobis orbis formido, ut quod causa animus futurus rutilus…" The Charmed chanted darkly from the Key of Solomon, having had it slightly translated by Annabelle and finding a summoning spell among the text. "Addo nobis orbis formido, ut quod causa animus futurus rutilus…"

Pamela stood at the edge of the attic, her arms folded tightly. Something wasn't right about this whole situation, and every bone in her body was making sure she knew, but she was powerless to stop it. And when it seemed everyone else was willing to attempt the spell, she decided to stay silent and not voice her fears.

"Addo nobis orbis formido, ut quod causa animus futurus rutilus…"

* * *

"We have to destroy it now!" Tyola spat, raising an arm and conjuring a crackling energy ball into her palm, before Diam grabbed her wrist and shoved her arm downwards, causing the projectile to fizzle out in a shaky tendril of smoke. "Diam! If they take the Eye, they will destroy is!"

"We can't destroy it that easily! It requires a ritual!"

"We don't have a choice! We can't get to the other artifact. It's in the afterlife! This is our only chance!"

"Then we'll find another way!"

"There _isn't_ another way!"

Before he could even move to stop her, Diam was thrown across the room when a burst of photokinetic light from Tyola's hand pummeled his chest, sending him into the air to destroy yet another table in the process of breaking his fall. Tyola then turned on the Devil's Eye, which had almost been completely summoned away. She strode over to it, wrenched it from the cosmos it was about to enter, and threw it down to the floor with supernatural force, smashing the artifact into pieces and leaving a sphere of angry red energy in its place.

Neither of them could have predicted what happened next.

Without warning, a portion of the sphere flew away from its other half, zipping out the window and obliterating what was left of the glass in the pane in an ear shattering smash. The remaining energy suddenly exploded, sending blood red light all through the room as it then concentrated into two direct beams that struck Diam and Tyola in the chest. Both screamed in agony as the force entered. Tyola, at one point, began to sprout fire from her mouth while Diam's eyes turned completely black. The crimson glow that had lit up the dark hall suddenly disappeared, leaving the two beings like they nothing had ever happened.

It had taken them.

* * *

"It's not working." Emma said mournfully, watching as the Charmed Ones chanted fruitlessly in trying to summon the Devil's Eye. She turned her head, looking down at Annabelle from her seat on the arm of the chair. "Are you sure that this is the summoning spell? Maybe all they're doing is sending it away to a place neither side can get to it."

"My Latin is perfectly fine, thank you." Annabelle replied, frowning defensively at Emma with her arms folded, "We're dealing with powerful forces here. Not every single thing in the magical world bows to the might of the Power of Three so easily." She said, a hint of sarcasm in her voice."

"They need to stop this now." Pamela suddenly admitted, staring at her aunts as they became even more driven in their chanting and efforts. "It isn't working, and to be honest, Latin spells always give me the creeps."

Aidan chuckled a little at this confession, "Why? It's a beautiful language, especially in spells."

"Yeah, you're right, it is beautiful." She suddenly looked around at him, her gaze intense with fear and anger. "But it's also pretty much a dead language, which makes the combination of the two even deadlier. People are fooled by beauty, so they don't see using a dead language is, in a way, raising the dead. And if Buffy's last two seasons taught us nothing, it's that raising the dead is never good."

"What about the bible? Or Emma?" Aidan challenged with a questioning glance.

Pamela looked over to see if Emma had heard her name being mentioned, which, to her relief, it seemed that she hadn't. It was with a pensive stare at the redhead that Pamela answered, "My jury's still out on both…" She murmured, before returning to her normal volume. "What's that noise?"

Leo, who also seemed to hear something, stood up from his leaning place on the table near the sofa and frowned, "Yeah, I hear it too… It's like a whistling or screeching sound or… something."

As if to answer their question, the north window of the attic suddenly burst inwards, the glass exploding into millions of tiny pieces before each piece was completely vaporized by the crimson energy that had just charged into the house. It hit all three chanting witches at once, encasing then in a vacuum of malevolent power as it entered their bodies in a similar way it had to Diam and Tyola. It surrounded them, being absorbed by their bodies and casting a red glow over the five astonished faces, before the funnel itself closed in on the Charmed Ones, finishing the process of taking in the energy with a sudden flash of light.

"Oh my God…" Leo breathed in terror, his eyes wide. Right now, his ability to sense evil was giving him a migraine, and he wasn't even trying to use it. The sheer darkness emanating from Charmed Ones nearly crushing his head. "No!" He hissed as Pamela moved to step forward, putting an arm out in front of her, "You can't do anything for them!"

Wordlessly, Paige took Piper's hand, prompting the latter to take Phoebe's, before all three of them vanished in a swirl of black and purple orbs that sent a dark chill through the room as they made their exit.

Pamela, determination shining brightly in her eyes, took her uncle's hand and hit him on the arm. "We're going after them. Orb."

* * *

As the black orbs began to appear on the other side of the hall, Diam and Tyola collected themselves and stood proudly in front of the doors that led out into the corridor, their shiny black eyes showing nothing but malice. The Charmed Ones materialized directly across from them, standing just in front of the wreckage from a nearby table and instantly dropping one another's hands.

The sides stood still and in silence before a few brief moments, apparently sizing each other up behind the darkness that was now a veil across all of their eyes. They said nothing, and raised their arms simultaneously, each side releasing the same amount of cataclysmic energy that sent a shockwave through the room as they collided, shaking the foundations to their core as they both fought for supremacy over each other, flooding the Great Hall with light and making it look as if blood was trickling down the walls.

It was into this maelstrom of power that Pamela and Leo orbed into, both of them nearly falling to the ground as another shockwave pulsed from the centre of the collision and blasted away part of one of the weaker walls with a thundering crash. "Leo!" Pamela screamed at the top of her voice so she could be heard, "Try and orb them out of here!"

"To where?" Leo bellowed back.

"_Anywhere!_"

Doing as he was told, Leo made a waving gesture at the Charmed Ones, cringing when nothing seemed to happen. "It's not working! I can't do it like this! The demonic power is too strong!" He shouted, thinking for a moment before looking at his niece, "I'm gonna grab them and see if it works then!" He said, suddenly striding out into the battlefield, his face set with the will to succeed.

"No, don't!" Pamela screamed, knowing what could happen, but it was too late. A stray bolt of blood red energy suddenly spiraled out of the epicenter, striking Leo's body and blowing him up into a silhouette of his body that was made entirely of orbs. But instead of reforming like they always did, the orbs began to float away into the air, being blown away by the continuing shockwaves and separating forever. He had been killed. "_Leo!_"

The last thing Pamela remembered was seeing the five combatants suffer the same fate. As the collection of power in the centre of the hall began to reach its boiling point, it gave off one final shockwave, vaporizing the Charmed Ones, Diam, and Tyola, scattering their ashes everywhere. With this last pulse, the walls of the Great Hall finally gave in, crumbling around the young witch and nearly bursting her eardrums as crash after crash assaulted her hearing. She looked up, and didn't even have time to scream as she saw a large piece of the roof come down on her, before everything went to white…

* * *

**TO BE CONTINUED…**


	31. And Nothing More

… **And Nothing More**

Colour. Colour and light.

Pamela forced her eyes closed from the blinding light that was in front of her, partially due to the brightness, but mainly due to the throbbing headache that was plaguing her. Resigning herself to the inevitable, she opened her eyes once again and allowed them to focus, seeing that she was only a few feet from a small fire. It seemed to be one of many, as Pamela could see more light in her peripherals, and feel more heat from around her.

Slightly relieved that she hadn't been staring into _the_ light, Pamela's next task was to get up. Her vision was hazy, probably due to her head injury, but she could see that, miraculously, she hadn't completely crushed by the falling debris. Forcing herself into a sitting position, she saw that something must have sheared into her right leg. Oddly enough, it was her head that was causing her more pain than the wide, bleeding gash in her leg, and she realized why when she raised a hand to her temple, finding her palm completely drenched in blood almost immediately. She had to get up and get help.

Somehow managing to get up onto her feet despite her practically useless right leg and pounding headache, Pamela was able to see what remained of Magic School. Even with poor eyesight, she could see there would be no rebuilding it after this.

It was just a mass of fire and wreckage. There were smashed up pieces of marble that lay on top of the boulder-like chunks of sandstone that had once acted as the school's invincible exterior, now looking pathetically and aged. Three years of high school memories, now a pile of rubble, the only sign of life being the large tree that had once stood in the now obliterated courtyard. Every leave had been torn from its branches in the shockwaves from the explosion, now leaving it with a dead and barren appearance that seemed to fit the ruins perfectly.

Her whole body flinched painfully when a noise that sounded like a thunder clap shook the scene. She looked up, her eyes widened with terror and shock when she saw a giant slash in the sky, exposing the enormous amounts of energy that had been used to create a safe plane for the school to exist on. Great purple flashes of light could be seen within the scar, with the odd fork of acid green lightning shooting from one side of the gash to the other, accompanied by a crash of thunder.

The explosion had been powerful enough to rip a hole in the realm. It truly was a miracle that she had survived.

Continuing forward shakily, she found a spot where the rubble seemed to subside into one flat, charred piece of the ground. She moved towards it, instantly recognizing the angry red glow that she had only seen for a few brief seconds before this. Steadying herself on a nearby block of sandstone, she stared into the flawless crater at the centre of this pandemonium, and saw the thing that had caused all of this.

The Devil's Eye.

* * *

Emma stared worryingly out of the smashed window as she approached it with her arms folded. The shards of glass that littered the floor crunched under her shoes with her slow steps, edging towards the window to inspect the melted edges of the glass that had managed to stay intact during the assault. She didn't even try to touch it, knowing that it was always bad when heat and glass were put together. "Something's wrong. Really wrong." She said firmly, turning to the three people in the room. "They should have been back by now, and if not the girls, at least Leo and Pam. This is just giving me a bad vibe all over."

"So, lemme get this straight," Brennan began, having come upstairs after hearing the window smashing, only to find that his wife had vanished, along with four other members of his family. "The girls try to summon this Devil's Eye thing, a source of colossal demonic energy, they get infected by it, Pam and Leo go after them, and no one ever thinks to say 'Hey, you know what? I don't think this is a good idea.'"

"It wasn't as simple as that." Aidan replied defensively, offended that Brennan was judging their actions in a situation he wasn't even present for. "They didn't have a choice. It was either killed or be killed at that point." He said, folding his arms and sighing, "Still, I'm worried. Like you said, Leo and Pam should have got back by now… Maybe something happened." The elemental looked around the shocked faces with a cynical expression. "Oh, please, like you guys aren't thinking the same thing…"

A soft wind spread through the room, bringing with it a gentle swirl of magical lights that spun around something that was materializing out of their centre. There was a sudden flash of light, leaving a bloodied Pamela standing in their place with a residual glow from her magic. She was holding something under her arm that seemed to be wrapped up in her jacket. "One Devil's Eye, safe and sound." She spat angrily, blood spraying from her mouth as she spoke, "Apparently, it restores itself after being destroyed." She added, slamming the covered artifact onto the table as she nearly collapsed.

"Oh my God! What the hell happened?" Emma exclaimed, rushing to Pamela's aid and helping her to stay standing as they walked over to the couch so she could sit down. "Easy…" She crooned as the young witch gasped in agony, twisting her body into a sitting position. "Where's Leo? And what about the girls? Did you get to them in time to do something?"

"Does it look like everything turned out okay?" Pamela croaked, her own voice sounding muffled due to her hearing still recovering from the loud explosions. Her throat was clogged with dust from the wreckage, so this sudden burst of passionate speech made her cough a little. "Leo's dead." She said flatly, no emotion in her voice. "And so is everyone else."

She looked around the room as the news hit each person in a different way. Something told her that Emma had known what had happened the moment she had transported herself back into the attic, and had been bracing herself for the confirmation ever since. The redhead's stony expression as she stared at the floor only validated this theory, tears of sorrow spilling silently from her eyes as she once again braced herself for the flood of emotions that was about to come crashing down around her from the other family members.

The moment Pamela and Leo had left the Manor to go after his wife and her sisters, Aidan had started to prepare himself for the worst possible outcome. But this, ironically, had been the one thing that he was sure would not come to pass. Paige was a Charmed One! The thought of any of them being killed –despite the fact that came under attack more than any witch– was just unthinkable. It refused to sink in, reducing the elemental to a near catatonic state as he tried to process what had happened. Paige, a Charmed One, the mother of his children, the love of his life, was dead.

Emma's heart took another hit as she felt Aidan's emotions fizzle out into nothing, sensing that he had now retreated into a place where he couldn't feel anything. It was then the overwhelming guilt that she had sensed earlier became the prominent alien emotion in her head, and she knew exactly where it was coming from.

Annabelle stood at the table where the Charmed Ones had tired to summon the Devil's Eye, looking down regretfully at the Key of Solomon that was resting her hands. Quietly, she placed the small tome in the copper pot, and lit a match, throwing it into the cauldron and immediately using her powers to accelerate the flames until they consumed the book. She blamed herself for what had happened. If she had taken more time with the translation, she probably could have prevented the deaths of four innocent people. For all she knew, she was responsible for this whole mess.

Brennan's anger nearly floored the empath as the news of his wife's death finally hit him. "No…" He growled angrily as Pamela hobbled over to the Book of Shadows, sitting down on the stool that was in front of the tome's altar. "They can't be dead. Not… not when we were just starting to sort things out. Not when they were so close to finally getting a break from all of this… No, they're not dead. She just _can't_ be dead!"

Pamela looked up from the Book of Shadows, seeing that Brennan had been standing over her as he spoke. Instead of responding with the sympathy and compassion Emma expected, the remaining adult Halliwell was uncharacteristically atrocious to him. "Gee, Brennan, I think you're right! Maybe people don't die when they're incinerated and turned into a pile of ash!" She said with wide eyes and a sick smile. "You know what? I'll call Piper right now and-,"

"How the hell can you be joking about this? They're all dead!" Brennan bellowed, cutting her off and slamming the Book of Shadows shut, nearly crushing her fingers within the pages if it weren't for Pamela's fast reflexes. "What is _wrong_ with you?" He demanded, staring at the young witch as she gazed at the metallic triquetra in the centre of the book's cover, seeing that the once perfect symbol was cracked and rusted. A symbol of the Power of Three's destruction.

"Brennan, I know you're upset right now, so I'm going let what you just did slide." Pamela replied darkly, looking up and glaring into his eyes with an ice cold stare. "But for future reference, never, _ever_, come between a Halliwell witch and this book. Got it?" She opened the book again, this time with a little more force, "And the reason I'm not sobbing on the floor is because I'm going to bring them back. I just… I know it wasn't meant to end this way."

"Oh, come _on_!" He replied, shaking his head angrily at the very thought, "Be realistic here, Pam. You're powerful, but no way near strong enough to either reverse time or bring four people back from the dead."

"You don't know that!" She croaked back, suddenly falling into another coughing fit from the strain shouting had put on her throat. This fit was worse the first, causing Emma to come out of her trance like state and spring into action, moving over to Pamela and supporting her as she continued.

"Okay, this is ridiculous. You can't do anything in this condition; we need an elder to heal you or something."

"I'll try to summon one." Annabelle immediately offered, walking over to the table once again to start the summoning ritual, only to realize she had no idea how to even begin calling an elder through the ways of magic.

"That won't be necessary."

Emma looked up from Pamela to see who had spoken. She bit her lip in frustration when Aidan blocked her line of view as he moved away from the new arrival. Once he had retreated to the main group, she could see who had spoken. It was Katrina, standing with her midnight blue cloak wrapped completely around her body as she surveyed the shocked face. She wasn't alone. Two men, also wrapped in cloaks, stood at her sides, looking around the room with a disdainful looks and repulsed sneers on their faces. "Don't bother getting the Elders involved. They don't really care what's happened; as long as the Hollow has been contained indefinitely."

"Who the hell are you?" Brennan asked quietly with a thin hint of barely concealed anger, glaring at the three new inhabitants of the attic.

"You probably have a lot of questions." Katrina said calmly, "And we have even more answers, but first…" Her arm flew from her cloak and she waved her hand in Pamela's direction. A white light consumed the witch in a bright flash that quickly dissipated, leaving her without a scratch or with a hair out of place. "We can't exactly have you in that sorry state, especially considering what we're about to put on your shoulders."

"What?" Pamela frowned.

"Later." Katrina responded, her gaze briefly flickering to Emma as she walked into the centre of the room. "Now, since you all know where that book came from…" She nodded at the Book of Shadows. "You must know who I am, so I'll save the introduction. But these two are…" She turned around, biting her lip as she surveyed the two men she had appeared with. "You two never did choose human names for yourselves, did you?" The redhead sneered.

"There wasn't any need." The man on the left stated, staring at Katrina through a veil of messy black hair and narrowing his piercing green eyes. "We weren't the ones who spent all our time down on Earth, Kaidra." He spat, revealing the Higher Being's true name. "You humans may refer to me as Vondar." The man ordered, raising his head slightly to try and seem like a greater being compared to them.

"And I am known as Insigil." The second man replied, having the same type of sparkling eyes as his two colleagues, with short brown hair somehow making him seem softer than Vondar. Just from the few sentences they had all spoken, it was clear that Insigil was the proverbial middle child with the other two when it came to arguments.

"So, you're Higher Beings." Brennan stated, folding his arms and locking eyes with Katrina. "Well, unless you have some way of bringing back my wife, then I really don't give a crap why we're here."

She smiled coyly, "Then you, my friend, are in luck." Her gaze met Pamela's shattered one, her smile fading into an indecisive expression. "We have a little choice for the new eldest Charmed One, seeing as how she's the leader of the family now."

"What the hell are you talking about?" Pamela asked wearily, not even sure if she had heard the woman right due to her fatigue and trauma, looking down at the rusted triquetra once again with a pang of sadness in her heart.

"I'm talking about you!" Katrina replied simply, "Well, not specifically about you. It was all our aunts' doing. You see, before the final battle with Satanos, they weren't sure whether or not their vanquishing spell would work, so they created a back door for their plan and made a brand new prophecy. Basically, if they died, or were unable to perform their Charmed duties, their Power of Three would pass on to you and your twin cousins so that there was still a source of power strong enough to kill Satanos if he killed them. Of course, it all worked out, and they didn't bother telling you, because there was no need." She smiled at the happy ending of her anecdote, "Although they probably should have told you before summoning the Devil's Eye."

"They… had no idea that it would go wrong." Aidan said groggily, as if he was waking from a long sleep. "Besides, no one ever expects to die…" He trailed off quietly, looking at the floor and hiding his face partially with his slightly long hair.

"But it didn't go wrong." Insigil suddenly interjected, looking toward Annabelle whose eyes had shot up at this revelation. "Your translation was perfect, this wasn't your fault." He turned back to the main group. "Diam and Tyola saw that the Charmed Ones were about to take the Devil's Eye back, so they made the extremely reckless move of destroying it physically, releasing the energy just as the Charmed Ones were trying to summon it…"

"So… what? Are you saying it split?" Pamela asked, her jaw clenching in anger, "So they basically died because of some stupid mistake?"

"That's the thing with humans." Vondar thought out loud, shaking his head. "Usually, when a loved one dies, their family's biggest problem isn't the fact that they're dead, it's the manner in which they died, and how it wasn't fitting for the person." He walked forward, in front of Katrina and survey Pamela with a cold stare. "Now, if I hadn't been outvoted, we would be leaving things the way they are. But Kaidra has developed a soft spot for this family, it would seem, and Insigil has always been more in tune with mortal emotions, so-,"

"We're giving you a choice." Katrina interrupted, making sure Pamela was listening. "Now, bear in mind: you, Melinda, and Emma are the only ones that have both the emotional connection and the power to do this. We're just giving you the means to use that power and link; this is entirely your decision. Not any of theirs." She said, gesturing casually to the other people in the room.

"Get to the point…" Pamela snarled quietly.

Katrina paced back and forth as she began to talk, casting her bright eyes to the floor and keeping them there with every step. "… You can do nothing. Leave things as they are with your aunts and uncle dead, making you and your cousins the Charmed Ones, and ensuring the world's security, since the Hollow has been neutralized due to Diam and Tyola's death… Or, you can use the reborn Power of Three to go back in time, fix things with the means we provide to ensure success. Your aunts and uncle would be alive again… but so would Diam and Tyola, and no one, even at our level of being, knows whether or not your aunts will defeat them and destroy the Hollow. If they do, then that's great, but if they don't… they'll die, along with six billion other people." She clasped her hands and took a deep breath after reciting the young witch's options, her eyebrows raised questioningly, "So, what's it gonna be?"

* * *

"What's there to think about?" Brennan asked the group rather aggressively, holding his arms out as if he would gladly fight anyone who challenged his opinion. "Pam goes back in time with the twins, stops the fight before it can escalate, and Phoebe and everyone else come back to life. Everybody wins!"

"Yeah, including the Hollow." Emma retorted calmly from her perch on the living room sofa. "If Pam does that, then Diam and Tyola come back to life, along with the possibility of the entire world being destroyed. We can't put four lives before six _billion_, Brennan, not to mention the millions of undocumented magical creatures out there!"

Brennan sighed angrily, as if he was trying to restrain himself from saying something he would regret. "No offense, Emma, but you're not even part of this family."

"There was a time where you thought Faith, your own daughter, wasn't family either." Aidan growled from the sofa, giving Brennan a look of disgust for resorting to such a comment regarding Emma when she was considered part of the family. He stood up to his full height the moment Brennan turned on him, a proud glint in the mutant's eye clearly getting in the way of rational judgment.

"You wanna say that to my face instead of behind a cushion, Aidan?" He snarled, walking closer to the elemental and glowering darkly at him.

"Gladly…" He responded, clenching his fists.

"Okay! Enough!" Annabelle suddenly boomed, leaping to her feet to separate to the two grieving men and gently pushing them apart before either of them had the chance to throw a punch. "I think you two have forgotten that this isn't your decision to make. And right now, the person who _is_ in charge of what happens is sitting in conservatory, alone, crying."

They all turned to look through the doorframe that gave them a window into the sunroom, finding that the blonde was right. Pamela, seemingly oblivious to what was going on the living room, sat in the room's uncomfortable wicker furniture, her feet propped against the table with the Book of Shadows in her lap while her finger traced the rusted triquetra in the middle of the cover.

"I'll go talk to her…" Emma said softly, unfolding her arms as she walked across the living room, "Oh…" She turned around, her expression going dark, "If you guys decide to swing at each other when I leave, you'll both spend the rest of the night unconscious." The redhead warned, "Okay?" She rolled her eyes when she got mumbles of agreement from both men, leaving Annabelle to deal with them.

Emma joined the grieving witch on the wicker sofa, propping her feet up on the table in a similar fashion and deciding to sit there in silence until she was ready to talk. "…I can't deal with this, Emma…" Pamela whispered calmly, continuing to stare at the book instead of making eye contact, a trait she had inherited from her life experiences, and from her mother. "I want them back, but with what I know now, I'd probably kill all of them again."

Shocked, the empath probed further, "Why?"

"Because they've just decided to shove me into a destiny that I never asked for!" She replied with passion, shaking her head. "I like my independence, and the thought of having to rely on two other witches for power just doesn't sit well with me. Neither does becoming the new biggest target for demons…" She face cracked a little as angry tears flowed from her eyes, "God! If it wasn't for this stupid… prophecy, I wouldn't even have to make this decision."

Emma pursed her lips and turned slightly on the sofa to face Pamela, her face steady with resolve, "Pam, they didn't make that prophecy just to spite you for no reason. They did it because you are the strongest person anyone in this family has ever met it." She shook her head fiercely when Pamela scoffed at this notion, "No, I'm serious. To have gone through everything you have and come out the other side unscathed is unbelievable."

"Oh, I was nowhere near unscathed…"

"But you recovered, didn't you? You regained that strength. The strength it takes to be the leader of this family… and the strength it takes to make a decision like this."

Pamela surveyed the redhead's face with glassy eyes, as if the answers to all her problems were hidden beneath Emma's skin. She turned away, rolling her teary orbs, "How am I supposed to decide…?"

"Listen to your instincts." Emma said simply, prepared to stand by the torn witch with whatever option she chose. "They've got you this far. Maybe they can help out here."

After apparently thinking this thought over for a few moments, Pamela gently placed the Book of Shadows onto the table and got up from the uncomfortable piece of furniture, sniffing quietly as she strode into the kitchen to gain some clarity within solitude. She stopped just before she was about to leave the dining room, placing her hand on the doorframe and not even turning around. "…I can't do this alone." She said simply, before vanishing into the kitchen.

"Where's she going?" Annabelle asked softly, walking into the conservatory with slow steps as if people were sleeping and she didn't want to wake them up.

Emma heaved a large sigh, closing her eyes and shaking her head slightly, "To finalize her decision."

* * *

Pamela jumped in surprise when Katrina was sitting calmly at the kitchen table, apparently awaiting her. "Oh, good, you're here." The witch said, walking further into the room to lean against the island in the centre. She took a deep breath, not noticing that the higher being refused to give her eye contact, instead she was choosing to stare at a plant pot in the middle of the table. "I've made my decision… I can't do this by myself. I can't just pick up the gauntlet and continue to fight the good fight if they're not here, so tell me how to save my aunts."

"You're making a mistake." Katrina said darkly, continuing to glare at the plant as if she could incinerate it with a look. Something told Pamela that she had the exact power to do that.

"Coming from the person who can't even give me an absolute." Pamela retorted smoothly, but still not coming off as arrogant or condescending. "Look, if you had said that my aunts have no chance against the Hollow, and they were going to die anyway, then yeah, I would have gone with majority option. But there's still a chance that they could defeat it, and when we lose that hope is when we really die." She folded her arms, "Besides, I can't look after this family by myself. Bring them back."

"I remember the days where you didn't need anyone." Katrina said wistfully, choosing now to make eye contact and nearly burn a hole in Pamela's soul with her gaze.

"Well, that's changed. I'm just an old fashioned family girl now." She replied with a small smirk.

"So you're going to take responsibility for what happens to the rest of the world?"

"What makes now different from every other week I do it?"

"Because you're not just dealing with some idiotic demon, that's what makes it different!" Katrina shouted, her eyes wide with anger. "You're dealing with the Ultimate Power, and it's already pissed off at your family for getting in the way of its servants all this time. Which reminds me: Diam and Tyola. Your aunts have had their asses handed to them in every single battle against those two. If they can't even vanquish them, what makes you think they can vanquish the Hollow?"

"Like you said, they're _my_ aunts." Pamela responded quietly, her eyes narrowing, "So bring them back."

Katrina got to her feet, biting her lip and trying to contain her temper as her thoughts spun wildly around her head. "Okay, I'll make you a deal. If you're still willing to go through with the same decision after this, then you'll hear no more protesting from me. Vondar and Insigil are another matter, but like I said from the beginning, this is your decision."

"…Alright."

* * *

"Where are we?"

Underneath the shade of the tree that they had appeared under, Pamela could see that they were in an idyllic valley. Vibrant, green grass seemed to spread for miles from their point, stretching outwards until it went out of your eyesight. The only darkness was the shadows that the clouds cast under the bright sunlight, and the shadow that the large house in the middle of the valley cast on the stables that sat behind it. Pamela assumed that was perfect for the summer and for keeping the animals out of the sun, as animals weren't really fans of intense heat.

"You've been here before." Katrina said, walking out of the shade of the tree and turning around to bask in the sunlight. "Although, it was covered in snow last time, and it was night."

Pamela nodded with a smile as she remembered where she was. "This is Brennan's mom's place, isn't it?"

The higher being nodded in confirmation, beginning to walk towards the house with her cloak sweeping gently over the top of the grass. "Come on, you need to see this."

They began to walk over to the house, and to Pamela's surprise, it only took a couple of minutes. She suspected that Katrina had had something to do with their haste, but it soon left her mind when they reached the sun drenched building. Brennan was walking along the side of a large table that was just outside the door, placing plates down on the surface as he went, accompanied by a boy who looked to be around ten years old. He had shaggy, black hair that went over his striking blue eyes every time he looked down to put knives and forks down next to plates Brennan was setting out. It seemed that this boy was Connor.

"Around six months after Phoebe's death, Brennan sells the house and moves back to the house that he grew up in, taking Connor and Faith with him." Katrina explained, "At this point, Connor's nearly eleven, and Faith just turned six. Brennan and Allison have started taking kids back into the house since Magic School was rebuilt. The two of them do light work for some money now and again, but they mostly use the money Julie left them to get by."

By this point, Brennan and Connor were nearly halfway around the table. "I'm not stupid, you know." Connor suddenly blurted out defensively, making Brennan stop what he was doing. "Those new drumsticks you got me yesterday, then the new _drums_ that you gave me last night… and now the big family dinner tonight." He looked up to his father's sad gaze. "Don't try and hide what today is. I've what it is since I was five, I don't need distracted from it."

Brennan sighed wearily, yet with a hint of relief. "I know, I'm sorry, I should've known better, but I certainly didn't hear you complaining yesterday when you were being showered with gifts!" He joked, smiling a little as he went back to setting out plates. "I was just gonna let you bring it up if you wanted. I didn't see the need to force you to react to the anniversary if you would rather deal with it yourself…"

"But I like talking about Mom with you." Connor replied simply, putting down more cutlery as he spoke. "… I had a dream about her last night. All three of them were in it, actually."

Brennan smiled warmly at his son, a little envious that his subconscious didn't treat him to visions of his late wife. "You did? What happened?"

"I think it was a memory or something." The boy responded, "I had just shot lightning at one of Aunt Piper's vases, but she had frozen it before it hit. And while Mom was telling me off, she was smiling because she found it funny." He laughed a little, looking up to his father. "Aunt Paige stayed quiet. She just rolled her eyes when Aunt Piper started to go a bit mad."

Brennan laughed at this, remembering the Halloween party well. "Yeah, that's a pretty good memory to have. Your mom and her sisters at their best." He smiled, before his cheeriness faltered a little. "…We do okay on our own, don't we? I mean, you and Faith are happy, aren't you?"

Connor beamed in response, "Yeah! I just… I miss her sometimes."

Putting an arm around his son's shoulder, Brennan pulled him in for a comforting hug, "It's okay, buddy. I miss her too…" They stayed like this for a few moments, before the mutant gently pulled Connor back a little. "Alright, go tell your Aunt Allison we're all set up for the food out here."

"Okay!" Connor replied enthusiastically, breaking away from his father and running wildly towards the steps of the house porch, bursting through the doorway to go and find his aunt and give her the news.

Brennan turned back to the table, heaving a sigh as he looked at everything that had been set out. He placed his hands on hips, a satisfied smile spread across lips as he looked towards the sky, admiring the beauty of the fluffy white clouds and perfect blue sky. "I hope you can see how amazing our kids are, Pheebs…" He whispered gently into the air, before heading into the house himself.

"Brennan stays in this house for the rest of his life." Katrina announced softly, "He never does find anyone else, but he is always surrounded by family and friends… He lives the rest of his life full of happiness and love, leaving behind the life of fighting and death, knowing that Phoebe took that down with her when she died…" Pamela remained silent during his explanation. "Come on." The redhead laid her hand gently onto the witch's shoulder, making them vanish in a ray of blue light.

* * *

Pamela breathed a sigh of relief when they materialized in Paige's living room. The room looked almost the same, apart from the dozens of photographs that now seemed to litter the entire room. Some of the pictures were of the entire family, but most of them were of just Aidan and the kids at different ages. Pamela smiled weakly when she remembered that Paige was always complaining about how they never took any pictures to remember the happy times, and now it seemed that Aidan had fulfilled her wish. "Well, at least this place is somewhere I recognize."

Her attention was suddenly drawn to the kitchen, from where a petite brunette with sleek, long hair had just exited, holding a glass of soda as she walked towards the couch. She sat down with a relaxed sigh as she picked up the book that had been sitting on the coffee table, presumably picking up from the latest page she had read.

"He gets _over_ her?" Pamela asked angrily, her eyes blazing with fury. "I would have expected Brennan to able to move on, but not Aidan. Not after all the crap he endured to be with her."

As if to answer her question, Aidan came in through the front door, his face covered in sweat and dirt and a traveling bag in his hand. Pamela assumed that he had just got off a rather intense shift. "Hey, Angela." He greeted the woman brightly, dropping his bag down on the floor, "Sorry I'm late. As you can see, work kinda ran a bit longer than I expected."

"It's okay." Angela replied with a smile, "The twins were a dream as always."

"Oh, babysitter…" Pamela whispered to herself, nodding.

"I'm so sorry for wasting your night again. I promised that I'd take this shift, and… well, it's a long and boring story." He reached into his jacket pocket, pulling out his wallet. "I know that you refuse to take money, but please…" He held a fifty dollar note out to her, staring at her with pleading eyes. "Take it. It'll make me feel better."

The woman rolled her eyes, "Put your money away, Aidan. Like I said earlier, the twins are a dream to look after, so it's really no trouble at all." She picked up her jacket from the back of an armchair in the living room and swung it around her shoulders, smiling warmly at the elemental as she went to leave. "Good night," She said as she was about to open the door, before suddenly turning around, her lips pursed with hesitation, "Listen, Aidan, do you… maybe want to grab a cup of coffee sometime?"

Pamela's sudden anger at the gall of this woman was replaced by the sorrow she felt towards her uncle, who looked like a deer caught in the headlights. His jaw had clenched defensively, and his face remained stony, but Pamela could that see through his eyes that this proposition had broke his heart for must have been the hundredth time since Paige's death. "Um…" Aidan turned around, nervously putting his hands together, "I would love to, but…"

"It's too soon." Angela finished her him, looking extremely ashamed and slightly frustrated. "I'm sorry, I should go…"

"No, wait." Aidan said, making her stop in her tracks. His mouth hung open for a few moments as he couldn't find the words that would express how he felt. "It's not that I don't want to… I just… can't right now…"

Angela nodded understandingly, opening the door and letting in a rush of cold winter air into the house as she stood there. "This is going to sound horrible." She announced, not turning around to face him, "I like you a lot, Aidan. But… I'm not going to wait forever…" The brunette said sadly, yet firmly, before leaving the house and walking out towards her car.

"Bitch." Pamela seethed, "The man has just lost his wife." She spat, glaring at the door.

"Not really 'just'." Katrina interjected softly. "It this point in time, Paige has been dead for three years, and Aidan's been circling the drain emotionally ever since then. His parenting skills have suffered in the process due to him delving into his work instead of dealing with his issues." She shot a sympathetic glance at the broken man in foyer as he rubbed his hands over his face, "Angela gives him the wake up call he needs, they get together eventually; and…"

"Stop it." Pamela interrupted, shaking her head. "I don't want to hear anymore." She scrunched up her eyes tightly, swirling on the higher being as she opened them. "This doesn't prove anything. Just because Brennan and Aidan survive, it doesn't mean Wyatt and Chris do. I mean, if I don't fix things, they're left with no parents. At least the other kids still have their fathers."

The redhead sighed in response, her eyes fluttering in fatigue over the whole situation. "You just don't get it, do you?" She snapped, putting her hand around Pamela's forearm. "Come on, there's just one more thing you need to see…"

* * *

Laughter. That was the first thing she heard.

Pamela could hear childish giggling from women in the other room. It seemed she had been transported to a future Christmas, given that the Manor's dining room had been decorated a plethora of different Christmas ornaments, even down to small strips of tinsel running round the seven dinner plates that were set out on the table. "What time are we in now?" She asked Katrina tiredly, who merely smirked in response.

"I can't tell you." She said, "For reasons that will become obvious once you step through that door." She pointed towards the kitchen, prompting the young witch to walk in, shocked at what she found in the kitchen.

She was staring at herself. Sure, she looked older, but she could still tell that this was her in future, mainly from the scar that ran down the woman's nose. Her face was covered in flour, and she was paralyzed by a laughing fit. Emma stood next to her, her fiery red hair now a little duller and swept up into a tight bun, presumably for cooking. "Okay…" Emma finally managed to say as they both began to stop laughing, "That is the last time you help me make pastry. For one thing, it's just too funny!"

"How was I supposed to know that I'd get hit by a cloud of the damn stuff if I squeezed the bag?" Future Pamela snapped with a frown on her face that quickly evaporated into a laughing smile. "I told you I wasn't good at cooking!" She said, still grinning as she raised her arms to her face to wipe the flour off on her sleeves.

Pamela suddenly took a deep breath as something passed through her incorporeal form. It was a little girl with thick brown hair flowing down past her shoulders and wide blue eyes that stared up at the witch's future self, "Mommy, can me and Andy open one of presents tonight?"

"_Mommy?_" Pamela exclaimed, her eyes nearly as wide as her apparent daughter's as she spun around to face Katrina with her mouth wide open in shock, "Mommy?" She repeated in a slightly quieter tone.

"Peyton, you know the rules. No presents until Christmas Day, you only need to wait one more night." Future Pamela said in a very motherly tone, shocking the present day version of herself even more by apparently being a natural parent.

"But Wyatt said he wanted us to open his tonight!"

"What?"

At this point, a tall young man with blonde hair entered, grinning cheekily at the two women in the kitchen. "Surprise!" He greeted them warmly, "I thought I'd drop by and hand in Peyton and Andy's presents tonight so they could open them tomorrow morning, instead of having to wait for me to get here." He heaved a theatrical sigh, probably put on for Peyton's benefit. "But since I can't make until the evening tomorrow, I wanted to see their faces when they opened them, so…"

"You decided to go over my head." Pamela said with her eyes narrowed, feigning anger at her younger cousin when really she was too happy to be properly angry. "Alright, go and open your presents from Wyatt, but that's it!"

The little girl bolted from the room, leaving Wyatt to smile guiltily, "Okay, I know you're mad, but…"

"I'm not mad." Pamela interrupted. "I'm just happy that we're all going to be here tomorrow…"

"Do you see now?" Karina asked softly, "The people you love will still survive without the Charmed Ones, along with the rest of the world… Let your aunts and Leo die in honour rather then in vain later down the line. It's for the Greater Good, Pam, the very thing that they were fighting for all these years, and now they've succeeded in preserving it. Please don't risk that victory, don't risk all this…" She gestured to the scene in front of them, where Future Pamela had just playfully hit Wyatt on the hand as he went for one of Emma's gingerbread men.

"Let's go back."

* * *

A bright flash of blue in the Manor foyer brought the two women back into the present timeline, landing underneath the frame that separated the foyer and the dining room. "Okay, now that I've shown you that things can still turn out okay without them… What's your decision?" Katrina asked immediately, "I'm sorry for rushing this, but with whatever decision you make, we need to altar history; and the further away that history gets, the harder it'll be to change."

Pamela was about to answer, when there was a dull thud, followed by a cracking noise in the kitchen. The two of them exchanged a confused look, before walking through the dining room to investigate. The moment Pamela saw what it was; she stopped Katrina at the edge so they could watch on without him seeing.

Brennan was shaking his right hand vigorously in the air, his teeth gritted in pain. Emma walked into their line of sight from the other side of the kitchen, going to inspect his hand, but he recoiled from her, revealing to the two eavesdroppers that he had punched a hole straight through the plastering of the wall, hitting the brick within. He walked in a circle, cradling his broken hand before sitting down at the kitchen table and beginning to weep, covering his eyes with his left hand. Emma too, began to cry as she sat next to him, placing a hand on his back reassuringly in a meek way of comforting him.

"…Tell me how to save my aunts."

* * *

"… Use this spell to open a gateway in time, and use this…" Katrina handed Pamela a piece of ancient parchment with Latin words inscribed on it. "To extract the power of the Devil's Eye from your aunts, Diam and Tyola. They both require the Power of Three, so you need to hold hands with these two…" She nodded at the twins, who were both standing at their eldest cousin's sides. "… When you're casting the spell to make it work. Once all that's been done, you'll fade away since this timeline doesn't exist anymore." She turned to her two male colleagues, "Did I get everything?"

"You forgot the part about her being extremely stupid with her decision." Vondar spat, shaking his head at Pamela with a sneer, "Putting four lives before billions… You're a selfish little-,"

"Higher being or not, you don't want to finish that sentence." Aidan warned darkly as he finished drawing the chalk triquetra onto the east wall of the attic, glaring at the man as he threw the chalk onto the table.

"That's enough." Insigil said firmly, glancing at both his partner and the elemental. "We must go so we're not affected by the alteration in history." He informed them, before looking over to Pamela. "Good luck."

Katrina clenched her jaw as she began to walk away, "I hope you know what you're doing…"

"So do I." Pamela replied, before watching the three beings vanish in a harsh burst of blue light that carried them away from this realm and to their own. "Okay, you two…" She said brightly to the twins as she knelt down to be at their eye level. "Are you guys ready to go on a trip with me? You'll see a ton of cool magic!"

"Okay!" Melinda replied, her eyes sparkling happily as she was completely oblivious to what had happened to her mother. "Is Daddy comin' with us?"

"Uh… No, sweetie. He has to stay here with everyone else because Uncle Brennan's… sick." Pamela hesitated, deciding not to mention that Emma and Annabelle were downstairs, making sure that Brennan didn't have another self destructive outburst that ended with an even worse injury. "Alright, let's go!"

Once Aidan had got out of the way, Pamela gave the first spell in her hand to Emma so she could hold it out in front of her while she held their hands. With a final look at the triquetra on the wall, she glanced down at the spell and began to chant softly, "Hear these words, hear the rhyme, heed the hope within my mind, take me back to where I'll find, what I wish in place and time."

The chalky triquetra crackled and sparked fiercely with neon blue electricity before it erupted in magical energy that was contained within the outline of the symbol. Getting back to her full height, she began to walk towards the portal. She could feel the twins putting up a little resistance, as it was their first time entering a vortex, but she continued to pull them through it and into the past.

* * *

As the black orbs began to appear on the other side of the hall, Diam and Tyola collected themselves and stood proudly in front of the doors that led out into the corridor, their shiny black eyes showing nothing but malice. The Charmed Ones materialized directly across from them, standing just in front of the wreckage from a nearby table and instantly dropping one another's hands.

The sides stood still and in silence before a few brief moments, apparently sizing each other up behind the darkness that was now a veil across all of their eyes. They said nothing, and raised their arms simultaneously, each side releasing the same amount of cataclysmic energy that sent a shockwave through the room as they collided, shaking the foundations to their core as they both fought for supremacy over each other, flooding the Great Hall with light and making it look as if blood was trickling down the walls.

It was into this maelstrom of power that Pamela and twins materialized into within a swirl of aquamarine energy that quickly dissipated as they emerged from the cosmos. All three witches from the future squinted against the bright red light coming from all around them, before Pamela knelt down and handed the next spell to Emma so they could save the future, "Decumbo obscurum pro totus infinitio , vomica nos vos vadum non per vestri malum lux lucis!"

What happened next looked like the complete opposite of when the girls had been infected. Crimson energy erupted from all of their bodies and joined with the collection in the centre of the two combatants. The veil of black that had set down on their eyes was lifted, leaving them with surprised expressions as a bright flash suddenly blew up from the middle of the hall. The energy vanished, leaving a reconstituted Devil's Eye on the floor in its place.

Piper was the first to notice Pamela and the twins standing at the side of the large hall, "What the hell?" She exclaimed, diverting everyone's attention to the three.

"Thank God…" Pamela whispered to herself and grabbed her cousins' hands, giving her aunts a warm smile. A soft golden glow enveloped the three of them, and they slowly faded away from the world, their task having being accomplished.

At this point, a column of orbs descended from the ceiling, depositing Leo and Pamela in the spot where the three witches had just faded away. They looked around, surprised that the battle seemed to have been stopped without their interference. "What happened?" Pamela asked, frowning at the Hall and how everything was still intact.

"Uh… You did, apparently." Phoebe said uncertainly, still trying to process what had just happened.

"The Eye!" Tyola suddenly exclaimed, bringing Diam out of his trance like state so they could make a move on getting the artifact back. The moment they stepped forward, however, they were sent flying in different directions by the power of Paige's mind via her telekinesis, who was currently taking her jacket of in a frantic manner.

"Devil's Eye!" She shouted; her jacket over her hands. The orb vanished in a cloud of white and blue lights, reappearing in the cradle she had made with her jacket by stretching it out over her arms. "Quick! What are we going to do with it?" She asked, watching fearfully as their enemies began to recover.

"I have an idea." Piper said confidently, "But first, we need to get the hell outta here."

* * *

With the night vision spell recast, Piper could now see where they were in the Deep Underworld. As she had hoped, they were in the exact same place as the last time they had came here; and therefore in the perfect position. "Okay, Paige. Go ahead and throw it down the gorge so we can go home and get some sleep. Having evil pouring from your fingers really takes it outta you."

The witchlighter scoffed at this notion, "Are you kidding me? What if it smashes or something? Then we'll have to go through this whole nightmare again."

"It won't." The eldest Charmed One responded tiredly, "The Key of Solomon said that its impervious to heat and fire, and since it's going straight down to Earth's core, it'll be fine, since I hear there's quite a lot of lava down there."

Paige still seemed to have trouble with this idea as they walked to the edge of the cliff, "I dunno… I mean, what's to stop Diam and Tyola from summoning it up from the centre of the Earth?"

"Magic." Phoebe interjected. "The natural world is part of magic as well, the earth, the sky, everything. By doing this, we're basically giving the Devil's Eye a magical shield that it thousands of miles thick. Even if we combined our powers with theirs, it still wouldn't be enough to summon it up here." She explained, also feeling the fatigue from having bared such power.

"Alright…" Paige said, staring into the Devil's Eye with a glare before she threw her arms up, causing the artifact to fly from her jacket cradle and descend into the never ending abyss. The three of them looked down as it fell, until they could no longer see the angry red glow coming from within its centre. It was gone.

"Go to Hell."

* * *


	32. Lay Down Your Charms

**Lay Down Your Charms**

Phoebe rubbed her neck wearily, stretching back in her desk chair and letting out a tired groan. She had been going over her column for the next day for the last two hours, and something still didn't feel right about it. After the disaster that had been averted with the Devil's Eye, she'd had trouble focusing on anything but trying to survive her daily life. "Dear Pampered in Presidio…" She read aloud from her own work, "Stop bitching about having a rich husband and just enjoy it, you self sabotaging hag." Despite herself, she giggled a little, before scrubbing out what she had written with her ballpoint pen and starting a fresh draft.

"Aw, that's a shame." Phoebe looked up to see Elise at her doorway with an amused twinkle in her eye. "I liked the first draft. Albeit, we'd end up with a lawsuit, but I liked it nonetheless." She said, walking towards the desk, her coat slung over her folded arms. "Okay, kiddo. It's time to call it a night. Come on, get your stuff. It's a bad sign when I'm clocking out of this place before someone. I'll walk you to your car."

"I dunno…" Phoebe said meekly, looking down at the page in front of her, "I hate leaving things unfinished."

"Phoebe, you're a few days ahead where your column's concerned, so why the hell are you even still here at eleven o'clock at night?" The editor exclaimed, staring down on her employee with a cold glare that she had honed after working in the media for years. "You having troubles at home?"

"No, home's great. Brennan and I are pretty much back to the way we used to be." Phoebe looked up, smiling a little when Elise raised her eyebrows questioningly. With a playful roll of her eyes, Phoebe stood up, grabbing her coat from the back of her chair and picking up her laptop bag from the side of her desk. "Alright, fine, let's go!"

* * *

"… And so I told the guy that if he wanted a full page ad, then he'd have to _pay_ for the full page ad." Elise finished her story as they came out of the elevator that led into the parking structure. "I swear; you meet a lot of morons in this business." She said ruefully while Phoebe smiled, amused at her boss' tale as they walked towards the middle Charmed One's Mini Cooper. "Anyway, I'll see you tomorrow, Phoebe."

"Okay, good night!" Phoebe called back, beginning to rummage in her purse as Elise continued to walk further down the parking lot towards her own car. The witch went to put the key into the lock, when a scream startled her, causing her hand to veer off target and scratch the paintwork of her car. She walked around her car to see the source of the noise, her breath hitching with fright when she saw what it was. "Elise!"

Elise had crumpled to the ground, clutching her gut as she fell to her knees before falling completely to the hard tarmac. A man wearing a blood stained leather jacket stood over her, his slick black hair hanging over one of his eyes as he turned to Phoebe, his athame glinting in the lights on the ceiling as he surveyed her with narrow eyes, "You're next, witch!" He spat, before suddenly hurling the bloody dagger at his new target.

Phoebe, who had spent years honing her reflexes and senses through martial arts, caught the athame by the handle just before it pierced her chest. She looked up, smirking, while really, her heart was pounding with the fear of how close she had cut it. "Vintage warlock…" She growled, throwing the weapon to the ground with a clink as she began to stride towards him, reaching into her purse before she dropped it, and taking out a potion vial which was slipped into her pocket moments after.

The warlock met her in the middle, swinging his fist at her face, only for the agile witch to weave out of the way and grab his forearm, using it for support as she raised her leg and kicked him forcefully in his left flank. The evil being doubled over a little, winded by the assault and putting himself in the perfect position for the heel of Phoebe's hand to break his nose with a sickening crack, before he received a roundhouse kick to the face, causing him to crash to the ground with blood pouring from his face. "This isn't over, I'm gonna-,"

"Shut up!" Phoebe shouted, hurling the vanquishing potion at his chest and not even bothering to look back at the warlock as he was being immolated. She was too concerned about her boss to stick around and see a vanquish she had witnessed hundreds of times before.

"Elise? Elise!" She called out as she knelt down next to the woman and tried to turn her over, seeing that she had bled out during the battle.

"Oh, my God!"

Phoebe's head shot up to see one of the assistant editors, Oliver, standing at the elevator, having apparently also decided to stay late. He had dropped his briefcase in shock at seeing his boss dying on the floor. The middle Charmed One instantly recognized the look in his eyes, for it was the look her and her sisters always got if someone found them next to a dead or injured person after vanquishing a demon. It was a look of suspicion and fear.

"Call 911!"

* * *

Wyatt's face fell as he entered the kitchen to see his mother put a box of cereal down on the table. He frowned in irritation, his eyes following Piper as she crossed the room, "Wait a minute." He said, walking in and inspecting the cereal that he had been having for the last few years before school, "You shouted upstairs that you were making pancakes."

"True." Piper replied, putting an array of different snacks and sandwiches into three brown paper bags. "But if I had told you that it was just the normal cereal, then you'd still be wasting time upstairs with your video games." She smirked, before realizing that her youngest son hadn't responded to her trick, "Where's your brother?"

"I dunno." Wyatt shrugged, sitting down at the table with a defeated sigh and begin to pour the cereal out into the bowl. "There's nothing but dust in this box…"

"Then get a new one out of the pantry." Piper responded, shaking her head and striding out of the kitchen, placing her hand on the sphere at the edge of the banister and glaring up the stairs, "Chris! Get your butt down here… before your pancakes go cold!" She still got no answer, "I swear, if you're still sleeping…" She climbed the stairs, charging into the boy's room, only to find it empty. The covers were disheveled, so Piper could assume that Chris was at least awake. "Leo, have you seen Chris?"

Leo, who had been passing the door on the way downstairs, stopped in his tracks at the sound of his wife's voice. "Uh… nope. I passed by a couple of minutes ago and the door was closed, so I just thought he was sleeping in or something." The elder suddenly looked heavenward, knowing of a trick that his children would sometimes play if they didn't want to go to school, "Chris! You'd better orb back here soon before your Mom goes crazy and blows up all of your comic books!" His threat was greeted with the silence that had filled the room moments ago, "Well, I'm out of ideas."

"Oh, you're a lot of help." The eldest Charmed One sighed, placing her hands on her hips until she saw Emma walked by the door, balancing Lorna on her waist as well as she could, "Emma! You haven't seen Chris, have you?" She asked, exasperated. Due to the fact that no one seemed to know where her son was, she was starting to lose her composure.

"Nope. Sorry." Emma replied apologetically, "Hey, if you haven't made the lunches yet, I can do it if you want."

"No, it's okay. I've already did them. Christopher Perry Halliwell, wherever you are, get back here now!" Piper suddenly boomed at the top of her voice, striding towards the attic. He had to be up there. The kids were always trying to sneak a look at the Book of Shadows, as it had been forbidden by their parents, so what better time to try and get past them than when they were all rushing around in the morning?

Emma and Leo watched her vanish up the steps, both staring at the staircase with wide eyed expressions, "Do you ever wish that mornings like this were _not_ the norm in this house?"

"All the time." He replied.

Piper strode forcefully up the attic steps, ready to shout at her disobedient son until she was ready to pass out. "I swear, Chris…" She began, "If you're not ready to go in the next ten minutes, I'll-," She cut herself off the moment she entered the top floor of the house, her eyes going wide with fear as she stopped in her tracks.

A celerity demon stood at the pedestal of the Book of Shadows, smirking confidently at the witch that had just entered the room. At his side, Chris stood with silent tears streaming down his face and onto his pajamas, his emerald gaze fixed on his mother with a mixture of terror and hope while the demon's two pronged blade dug into the back of his neck.

"Let him go now, or I'll-,"

"You'll do what?" The celerity demon sneered cockily, "Even you must know what my kind is famous for, witch. I'd slash his throat before you even raised your hands." This threat elicited a small whimper from Chris as he began to visibly, "Oh, and don't even think of orbing." He warned the boy, kneeling down to whisper in his ear, "If you try, I'll kill you…"

"Mom, please…" Chris pleaded; his lower jaw quivering as he spoke. It looked like he was barely managing to maintain this shaky level of calm, and the demon's murmured threat had nearly pushed him off the edge, but he remained silent, quietly crumbling so he didn't anger his captor.

"Please, just let him go." Piper asked, now realizing it was her turn to plead, "I'll do anything, I'll give you anything… Me! Take me instead. You can kill me, take my powers, I don't care, just please… _don't_ hurt him." She had now clasped her hands together nervously, beginning to tremble like her son.

"While your offers are tempting, none of them are what I'm after." He glanced down at the Book of Shadows that lay in front of him. It was so close, and yet so far at the same time. "Bring me the book and I'll release him. And I don't mean just leaving it with me while I still can't touch it. I want every single protection hex, charm, incantation and spell lifted, and if you try anything…" He suddenly swiped his arm around Chris, bringing him in closer and holding the two sharp prongs against the child's jugular, "… You're gonna be shopping for a teeny tiny coffin." With a final smirk, he suddenly vanished in an explosion of grey smoke that carried both demon and child away from the scene.

"_Leo!_"

* * *

Paige stood in front of the stove with an elated smile on her face as she flipped the two pancakes she was cooking in the pan. Setting the spatula on the counter, she walked across the kitchen and opened one of the cupboards, smirking with delight as she pulled out a bottle of chocolate sauce. She returned to the stove, shaking the bottle vigorously before setting exchanging it with the spatula and going back to making breakfast for herself.

She momentarily froze when she felt arms snake around her waist, until she saw the wedding band on the hand that was on her stomach, giving her husband's identity away immediately. "Well, thank God you took that shower." She said with a smile, "I mean, I know what we did last night was kinda spur of the moment, but it wouldn't have killed you to wash first."

"I didn't exactly hear you complaining." Aidan responded, resting his chin on her shoulder before looking down at her attire. "Um… Honey, why are you wearing my underwear?" He asked with amused curiosity, seeing that Paige was wearing a pair of his boxers underneath a white t-shirt that was also his.

Paige shrugged bashfully at this, flipping her pancakes again. "Well, I was hungry, and your stuff was closest to the bed, so I improvised. I think I pull it off pretty well, don't you?" She asked with a smile, breaking free from his embrace so she could put the pancakes onto the plate she had laid out and drench them in chocolate sauce, causing Aidan to laugh.

"It just wouldn't be 'a morning after', Paige Matthews style, without you eating _something_ that contains chocolate." He said, leaning back on the counter and putting his hands in his pockets as his wife sat down at the table and instantly lost the grace she had had in his eyes a moment ago, due to her rather primal eating habits. "You know, you could use a knife and fork. It's a lot more hygienic and saves me from losing _my_ breakfast."

Paige sneered at this notion, taking another large bite out of her pancake and letting chocolate sauce dribble down her chin a little. "How can you eat pancakes with a knife and fork?" She asked, genuinely perplexed at the very thought. "Besides, I don't have time for etiquette. Thanks to you letting me sleep in, I only have an hour until my meeting with an artist from Norway. I forget his name… Anyway, I still need to put on my face."

"Oh please, you look fine." Aidan said; shaking his head as his wife rose from the table and put her dirty plate into the sink, wiping her mouth with a cloth as she ran the hot water to wash it. "Just take shower, jump into your clothes, and go. You'll be out the door in ten minutes, which is more than I say for the kids…"

Paige cringed slightly, "That bad, huh?"

He nodded with a tired sigh, "Melinda orbed Emma's backpack onto the roof after Emma had blasted the head off one of her Barbie dolls, because Melinda had woken her up with a little light show, probably because… Forget it; it's a big circle of vengeance. We have very vindictive children." He said, groaning at the memory of one of the neighbours catching him out on the front lawn with his daughter, telling her to get a backpack down from the roof. "I wonder where they get it from."

"Oh, it's definitely me. I'm not even going to try and hide that." Paige said, smiling as she walked over to him and draped her arms over his shoulders and around his neck. "And by the way, I can't just jump into my clothes. You're my husband, you're meant to say things like that, so your love for me discredits you. I can't take anything you say about my appearance at face value." She explained, smirking a little.

"Ah, I see. So I should probably stop giving you compliments then." He said, returning her coy smile and placing his hands on her hips.

"Oh, no, don't stop." She said leaning upwards and capturing his lips in a heated kiss which he returned.

The couple, oblivious to everything around them, didn't notice the darklighter orb into the kitchen doorway. From the tribal tattoos running down the side of his face, it was clear he was part of one of the darklighter factions that had been created to hide their kind from the demons, during a civil war in the Underworld a few years ago. The factions allowed them to disperse to different locations in the Underworld in small numbers, ensuring that darklighters survived even if a faction was caught.

Aidan opened his eyes when he heard the arrow click into place on the crossbow, and immediately grabbed his wife by the arms and threw her to the side and out of harms way as the projectile flew from the weapon. The arrow pierced Aidan's chest, going right into his heart and causing blood to pour out onto the khaki coloured shirt he was wearing. He stared at his attacker as his eyes glazed over, before he toppled to the ground with a thud, blooding gushing out onto the tiled floor.

"_No!_" Paige screamed, scrambling across the floor to her husband, ignoring the darklighter that was looming over her until she came to her senses. Her head spun around towards him, angry tears sprouting from her eyes, "Arrow!" She screamed, her lungs burning with rage as the arrow embedded in Aidan's chest vanished in a swirl of sparkling orbs, and landed in the chest of the darklighter. The evil being looked down at his mortal wound and let out a roar of agony as he exploded in a gout of fire, black orbs flying everywhere before fading away.

"No… Please, c'mon." Paige whispered to herself as she held her hands over Aidan's wound, summoning more healing energy than she ever had before. This willpower erupted in a bright flash of light as her power activated and bathed the elemental in a warm golden glow as his wound began to close up, taking the blood that had poured out with it and bringing her husband back to life.

Aidan's eyes shot open as he gasped the first breath of his renewed life, only to be caught by Paige, who was still on her knees on the floor, cradling his head as he tried to sit up properly, as his shirt had been stained with his own blood and he wanted to change it quickly.

Paige didn't even notice the column of orbs fall from the ceiling that deposited Piper and Leo in the kitchen just a few feet away from her. It seemed that Piper also shared this ignorance, as she didn't even notice that emotions were running high in the scene she had just orbed into. "Alright!' She boomed, "Put some clothes on, you have a nephew to save!"

* * *

Chris sat in the fetal position within a circle of deep purple crystals. After being taken from his home, he had lost all of his bravery and had broken down into full blown sobbing within the magical cage. This was his first time in the Underworld, and from what he'd seen of it, he never wanted to come back again. Once this was over, he was going to make sure that Wyatt knew that this place was terrible too, so he wouldn't get so excited about fighting demons anymore. "Enough with your crying!" The celerity demon suddenly boomed from outside the prison, staring down at the little boy with raging eyes as he shouted.

"Don't you dare talk to my son like that."

The celerity demon turned around, smirking with delight when he saw all three Charmed Ones and Leo stride into the cavern. The Book of Shadows, now presumably disempowered, sat underneath Piper's arm as she couldn't bring herself to take her eyes off her son. Her sisters didn't appear to be much better off than her. Phoebe looked as if she would collapse from fatigue any moment if the dark circles around her eyes were anything to go by, and as Paige had decided to just grab a pair of jeans from the dryer due to the urgency of the situation, along with a pair of sneakers, she looked no better in an outfit that was nearly entirely made up of her husband's clothes. Combining all that with their tear stained faces, and the Charmed Ones didn't exactly look like the most powerful witches of all time.

"Well, you three are certainly a sight for evil's sore eyes." He chuckled, before turning his eyes onto Leo, "And what do we have here, an Elder? You should probably be really careful down here. The bounty on your kind's head is great."

"Give me back my son, _now_." Leo growled, his fists clenched tightly as short bursts of electricity ran down his forearms due to him not being able to keep a lid on his anger. He went to raise one of his hands and strike the demon, but Piper quickly jutted out her own hand and pushed his arm down before he could do anything.

"Let him go, and we'll give you the book." She ordered calmly, now grasping the Book of Shadows with both hands in front of her.

He surveyed the foursome darkly, feeling that they may have something up their sleeves, but given the disheveled appearance of all three witches, they didn't look as if they had a scheme in them so these thoughts quickly left the demon's head. "So it's been completely disarmed?"

"My son's life is in your hands." Piper responded simply, "Do you really think I'm stupid enough to try something when you have that kind of power over me?"

The celerity demon grinned broadly as the Charmed One lavished his ego, "Good point. Hand it over."

"Oh please." She snarled, "Let him go, then I'll give you the book."

He seemed to think this over, before suddenly turning towards the cage, where Chris had stood up immediately at the sight of his family coming to the rescue, "Kid, I'm gonna take one of these crystals away, and you'll be free. But if you move before I tell you to, you have no idea the kind of pain that I'll inflict on you. Got it?" The boy nodded vigorously in return, prompting the demon to pick up one of the purple crystals and dismantle the cage. "Alright, throw the book down in between us, and then he can go free."

Complying, Piper tossed the book onto the dusty ground between them, allowing Chris to bolt from the cage and straight towards his father, who had been kneeling down, ready to grab his son the moment they got him back. Crying into Leo's shoulder, the two of them vanished in the cloud of orbs that shot up through the cavern's ceiling, the echoes of Leo's calming words to his son traveling through the chamber as they left.

"Gotcha…" The demon whispered to himself as he grabbed the Book of Shadows from the floor, grinning widely at the cover as he realized that he had performed a feat that no other demon had accomplished. "You might wanna get outta here." He said to the three witches, a cocky glint in his eyes as he spoke, "Who knows? I may find a way to vanquish you in here."

It was Piper's turn to smirk, "I don't think so..." She growled, before she and her sisters suddenly vanished in a flare of crimson light that swallowed their forms before completely removing all trace of their existence.

Realizing what this meant, the demon would only look on in horror as the tome in his hands also dissolved in a red glow, leaving him with nothing but air within his hands. Hearing footsteps, he spun around to see the real Charmed Ones advancing on him. "No!" He screamed, suddenly running at them in a blur of supernatural speed, until he came to a complete stop, inches away from the three women.

"Wow, good thing I saw that coming." Piper said, grateful that she'd had the foresight to know that an attack was coming, and freeze him before his blades could hit home. With a final hand gesture, she blasted the evil being into oblivion as an explosion consumed his body, before it blew outwards, leaving nothing but a wisp of smoke in its wake. "Thank God for astral simulations, huh?" She asked her two sisters, who both remained silent, "Um… Don't take this the wrong way, but you guys… kinda look like crap. What happened?"

The two younger siblings exchanged a look, before Phoebe, "Well, I don't know what happened to you…" She nodded in Paige's direction, "… but I've been at the hospital all night. Elise was stabbed in the paper's parking lot last night by a warlock who went through her to get to me." She ignored her sisters' shocked expressions as she continued, "Her sons can't get into town until tonight, so I stayed with her. I didn't want her to be alone if she woke up."

"Did you vanquish the warlock?" Piper asked with a concerned tone.

"Yeah." She replied. "I got his athame too, but it looks pretty generic to me, so I'm thinking it was just one stupid warlock acting alone. I'll need to check the book to confirm all that, of course. I was gonna come over this morning, but then Leo orbed to me and, well, you know the rest."

"Why didn't you call for me or Leo when it happened?" Paige asked in confusion.

"I was about to, but then another one of my bosses walked in on the whole thing and I panicked."

"What about you?" Piper asked, turning her gaze to her youngest sister, "What the hell did we orb in on this morning in your kitchen?"

"My husband nearly losing his life courtesy of a darklighter." She reported sassily, her face still stony with rage at the attack, "It came for me, but Aidan took the hit instead… straight into the heart. If I had moved just a second slower, I would be a widow right now."

"But you were fast, so it's okay. He's fine." Phoebe said comfortingly, going over to her baby sister and putting her arm around the witchlighter's shoulder, taking her hand and giving it a reassuring squeeze, "Okay, so we have a demon, a darklighter, and a warlock… What else have we got?"

Paige snorted with laughter, "The start of a really bad joke?"

"Besides that." Phoebe replied with a smirk, "Seriously though, the fact that we've all been attacked like this must mean something, especially since it's been three extremely different evil beings to attack us. I mean, when was the last time you heard of a demon and warlock teaming up? They hate each other! The only time I can think of would be…" She trailed off into a whisper, realizing what this meant. "Oh, God."

"No way." Piper scoffed with a glare, "They can't have a new Source, for one thing, the powers of the Source are long gone into the void, and the Grimoire is still hidden from them."

"Yeah, but we all know that a demon who was powerful enough could summon it to them." Paige pointed out, staring down at the floor and letting out an angry sigh. "This is just what we need, as if Diam and Tyola weren't enough. It's just one of those days where you shouldn't get out of bed." She said, not realizing that both her sisters had picked up on the thinly veiled anger and fatigue in her voice.

"Tell me about it…" Piper sighed in agreement, "Okay, let's just get outta here. I feel weird airing out our problems in the Underworld."

* * *

Keith sneered at his arm as he slapped a nicotine patch onto his bicep. This was followed by him bursting one of the blisters on a packet of nicotine gum and popping the exposed piece into his mouth with haste, chewing on it like his life depended on it. Since Gwen had moved in, he had decided to try and quit smoking completely. This decision had been spurred by his knowledge of knowing that second hand smoke was dangerous to pregnant woman. The second reason was that he found it hard enough to hide his habit from Pamela, and adding Dean into the people he had to hide from would be too much work, so he thought it would be easier this way.

He had not foreseen the hellish conditions of going cold turkey.

He hadn't slept properly in the two weeks, and had even resorted to organizing all his drawers in the middle of the night. The headaches that withdrawal brought on felt like they were shattering his skull, along with causing him to shake slightly all the time. He had even started to think about the things that he would do for a cigarette before he stopped himself, as the things he came up with started to sicken him. And then there was the letter he had received this morning…

"If I could go back in time, you know what I'd do?"

Gwen frowned uncomfortably from the sofa in the living room, knowing that Keith's discomfort was being indirectly caused by her presence. "No… What would you do?" She asked nervously, hugging her knees as best as her pregnant belly would allow.

"I'd kill my big brother before he could hand me his cigarette to hold at one of his parties when I was fourteen." Keith said, smacking his fist into his palm, "He decided that jumping in the pool would be more fun than making sure his younger sibling didn't let curiosity get the better of him and take that first drag." He let out a longing sigh, shaking his head, "I'm sorry, I'm making this out as if its your fault, but it's not. Pam's been bitching at me to quit for ages, so I guess I just needed the motivation of a life being at stake."

The young woman chuckled a little, "You mean your girlfriend specifically asking you to quit isn't enough?"

Keith's eyes widened with shock and embarrassment as his face turned red, "Uh… who told you that we were boyfriend and girlfriend?" He asked, confused.

"No one. You guys just act like you are when you're around each other." Gwen replied simply, narrowing her eyes a little as she recalled something from her memory, "I tried asking Dean about it, but all he did was laugh a little." She winced slightly when she realized her mistake. "Oh, God, I'm so sorry. My foot tends to have a permanent space in my mouth… I take it you guys aren't together?"

"No." Keith responded flatly, "Well, we used to be, but then… it's complicated. Never mind. It won't even matter in a few months anyway…" He muttered under his breath, but he hadn't been quiet enough.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Gwen asked, "… Is it anything to do with that letter you were stressing about this morning?"

"How do you know about that?"

She rolled her eyes in response, "I can't go out much these days, so I've basically memorized all the little ticks that you guys have. When it comes to stress, Dean tries to minimize the situation and laugh everything off, Pam gets edgy and snaps at everyone, and you…" She smirked, "Well, you mumble reassuring words to yourself while pacing around the room you're in."

Keith blinked a few times, astounded by the girl's acute sense of perception of her surroundings, "Wow. You know, it's one hell of a shame that you don't go to school anymore." He said, sharing a small bittersweet laugh with the teen, before it went back to the silence they had shared for most of the morning.

The same silence was instantly broken when the door burst open suddenly. Jordann was being helped into the apartment by Pamela and Trent as they helped her keep off her feet by holding the feral's arms around their shoulders. "Okay, we need some stuff to clean up her leg, and fast!" Pamela announced, bringing Keith and Gwen's attention to the bleeding gash that crossed Jordann's left calve.

"What happened?" Gwen asked, getting up from the sofa as the three of them made their way to set Jordann down in the place she had been sitting in.

"She… uh… She tripped in the street and fell on a broken bottle." Pamela said with a comforting smile, gently lifting up the leg of her friend's jeans to expose the wound fully, causing Jordann to grimace in pain as her pants were pulled from the dried blood of her injury. "Honey, could you do me a favour and go and get a roll of gauze from the bathroom?"

"Dean's in the shower, and he always locks the door when he goes for a shower." Gwen replied with a hint of irritation at her boyfriend's paranoid habit.

"My bathroom has some bandages." Keith jumped in immediately, sensing that Jordann's injury had definitely not been caused by a broken bottle. "They're on the top shelf of the cabinet above my sink in a pale green packet." They watched Gwen vanish down the corridor as fast as her feet would allow her, before Keith turned back to the three that had just came in. "Okay, what really happened?"

"That goddamn witch hunter, that's what." Jordann spat, "I went to kick, and he went to slash. This is what was produced." She said, glaring down at her injury. "I can't believe this. No one has ever bested me in a fight before. Do you remember when those guys tried to mug us in the campus parking lot, Pam? I kicked all five of their asses, and yet I can't beat some cloaked lunatic with a blade."

"Don't take it too hard." Pamela replied reassuringly as she dabbed the wound with a damp cloth that Keith had provided. "Witch hunters may be human, but they can also drain the powers of the witches they kill, so I'm guessing the son of the bitch must have killed a different type of feral or something." She looked over to Trent, who had just put a plastic bag down onto the opposite sofa, "Not that I'm ungrateful for your help in getting Jordann into the elevator, but what were you doing in the lobby anyway?"

Trent nodded over to the bag that he had just put down, "I was coming up to give Keith and Gwen some things that I took from the apartment all those years ago. It's just old toys and stuff; I thought he'd appreciate it, what with a new baby and all." He laughed bashfully at Pamela's frown, as she was clearly confused as to why he had taken these things. "Since we don't know if it's a boy or a girl yet, I put in some of your stuff too."

The Halliwell witch immediately stopped dabbing her friend's wound, distracted, "Some of my stuff? I don't remember playing with any toys when I was little. If you remember correctly, I was never a Barbie girl."

"Uh… Hi! Remember me, your wounded friend?" Jordann snapped, smacking her friend lightly on the shoulder as Gwen walked back in, carrying the gauze and a bottle of disinfectant. "Aw, crap. You bought that stingy stuff? Gwen, we were getting along so well before this."

Gwen chuckled a little as she sat down on the sofa at Jordann's feet. "My mom's a nurse, so I know how to do all these things, and trust me, you never know what was in that broken bottle, so the best thing to do is to clean it properly." She went to dab the wound with a disinfectant soaked piece of cotton wool, when Jordann flinched involuntarily, "Oh, don't worry, this won't hurt a bit…"

"Pam?" Jordann called out quietly, eyeing the hallway with wide, fearful eyes. "Could you please go and lock the cat in another room or something?" Pamela turned to see that Nightshade was casually sauntering down the hallway. She leapt up onto the couch and began to sniff at the bag Trent had brought in, before she turned her amber gaze onto Jordann, "You know how I am about predator animals."

Pamela smirked at this request, rising to her feet, "Sure…" She said, picking up the cat and walking down the hallway, unaware that Keith was suddenly tailing her, "It's okay, honey. Don't take personally; she's like that with any animal that likes to eat meat." She cooed to her pet, gently placing her on the bed and tickling her behind the ear, "Now, if you were a hamster, there wouldn't be a problem."

"Um… Can we talk for a minute?" Keith asked nervously in the doorway. When Pamela nodded, he opened his mouth to begin what he had to say, only to be distracted by a pair of glowing yellow eyes that were leering at him from the top of the witch's closet. "In private, if that's okay?"

Pamela frowned at this odd request and turned around to see what he was looking at, rolling her eyes when she saw, "Oh, fine." She agreed, "Arc, could you go and check out the warehouse me and Jordann went to this morning? The witch hunter may have come back." She asked politely, smiling kindly at the gargoyle who was perched majestically on the front edge of her closet.

"As you wish, Miss." He replied, before flying from the room in a whoosh that made Nightshade flee under the bed in fright.

Turning back to her roommate, Pamela gave him a bright expression, "What's up?"

"Uh…Alright," Keith began, clearing his throat and sniffing, "There's no easy way to say this, so I'm just gonna say it. When I went for that job interview a few weeks back… well, it was just a desperation kinda thing. I didn't think I'd get it, but… I got a letter through this morning, and it turns out I did. The pay's great, the work is fantastic, and I'd be working with some of the most gifted photographers in the world."

"That's great!" Pamela beamed, before narrowing her eyes, "… Why would you think I would take that badly?"

"…The job's in London."

* * *

The Charmed Ones instantly tensed as they materialized in the attic, finding both Diam and Tyola standing casually next to the Book of Shadows' altar. The two beings looked up as the witches entered, but they didn't move to make an attack, and instead went back to the position they had had before the interruption. "Piper, blast them!" Paige ordered loudly, prompting her eldest sister to raise her hands into their normal attacking position so she could propel Diam out of the window.

Unfortunately, the explosive magic was somehow caught within Tyola's palm. She opened her fist out, revealing that only a wisp of smoke remained of Piper's attack, which was quickly blew away by her own breath. "Put the hands down, Piper. For once, we just want to talk with you girls." She smirked as Diam got up from his perch nearer the window and joined her, "We have an offer for you."

Piper narrowed her eyes, "What kind of offer?" She asked suspiciously.

"The kind that would give you the normal life you covet… if you agree." Diam answered; his expression stony as he started to explain. "We've tried tricking you, we've tried stealing from you, we even tried racing you for the Devil's Eye, but everything so far as ended with in a draw. I think you can agree with that."

"Get to the point…" Phoebe growled.

"As you wish." He replied with a courteous smile, "We're now trying to take the peaceful option with you, and that is summed up in our offer." He exchanged a glance with Tyola, where he received a nod of agreement, "Okay, here it is. You use the spell in the book that strips you of your powers and give them to us so we can release the Hollow. In return, we'll make sure you and your families survive what's to come, and you get your demon free life on top. How's that sound?"

Piper was the first to answer, laughing darkly, "Go to hell. How selfish do you think we are? Do you really think we'd decide to kill billions of people for a so called promise of security from you? We wouldn't even have our powers to defend ourselves against the likely double cross."

"Believe or not, Piper, but we never meant to hurt any of you." Tyola added softly, placing her hand on the book's pedestal. "We're a neutral party, and all we've wanted is the best for the world from the very start."

"Neutral?" Phoebe glared, "Forgive me, but your homicidal actions speak louder than words! Your colleague over there…" She waved her hand angrily in Diam's direction, "… killed an entire office building full of people, and then proceeded to kill my sister and two of my friends!"

"I knew that the Grand Elemental would fix that." Diam sneered, shaking his head and rolling his eyes. "I only did it in an attempt to scare the three of you off from trying to stop us. And now, nearly two years on, we're all in the exact same position we were back then, deadlocked with each other. Although, I have to say, I'm really impressed. You girls have proven yourselves to be extremely powerful. Not many magical beings go toe to toe with us and live to tell the tale."

"Oh, _stop_. I'm blushing!" Paige muttered sarcastically, "Piper and I saw the future while Phoebe was in labour. We saw the future that you bring with your apparent neutrality, and I'm pretty sure Future Piper would be glad to back us up if she wasn't dead!"

"Actually, she wouldn't." Tyola replied coolly, "That future was a future where you guys had decided to fight against us, and while you put up one hell of a city decimating fight, we won in the end." She finished darkly, her eyes narrowing threateningly, "This is why we're giving you the opportunity for a peaceful surrender, because after this, the only option is all out _war_."

"And that is something you won't survive." Diam added lowly, "Listen, the Hollow is only meant to absorb magic. Things got out of hand all those centuries ago because magic fought back. To protect itself, it began to absorb physical entities. It's your ancestors' fault that things escalated that far. If you give us your powers peacefully, no one will be hurt." He walked around the tome's altar, heading forward to the girls. "The only thing we want is the rebirth of magic. It's become a flawed system and great days of old are long gone. You have the Elders sealing themselves away in the heavens, lording over all of good magic and antagonizing those who go against rules they had no right to set in the first place. And then who have the demons, who are driving themselves to extinction with their backstabbing and in turn, they're wrecking the balance and messing up the Grand Design. Now, that backstabbing has been calmed recently with the rise of a new Underworld leader, but it's not going to be enough. Someone has to take charge."

"Oh, so that would mean that you two would be lording over all of magic with rules you had no right to set in the first place?" Piper scoffed.

"No." Tyola replied calmly, stepping around the altar to join her partner. "We'd set the wheels in motion, but after that, it would be up to destiny. Can you imagine it?" She asked wistfully, "With magic starting over again, peace would reign for centuries since each side would have nothing to fight with. You could have close friends without the fear of friendship ever being used against you." She said, directing her gaze to Phoebe, "… Your children could sleep peacefully at night without the threat of demons…" She told Piper, "… And you and your husband could live long, happy lives without having to worry about being killed before your time. No one would be hurt, as the few beings that do rely on magic for their existence are too corrupt with power anyway. And it would all begin with the relinquishment of your powers. After fighting for so long… it would be a fitting way to end your time as witches, don't you think?"

The three witches stood in silence, not sure how react to all this information. The two of them seemed to be genuine, and their story fitted with everything they had done so far. They had always been searching for power, only to be thwarted by the Charmed Ones, and in the times they had attacked; it had been in the pursuit of enough power to release the Hollow. "Take a hike." Phoebe spat venomously, angry at herself for nearly being pulled in, "We basically got the same speech six and a half years ago from the Avatars. It didn't take back then, and it certainly won't take now. Get out!"

Tyola put her hands up, as if she was surrendering, "Alright, fine. We'll give you some time to think it over…" She turned away, putting her hand gently on Diam's arm so she could transport him out with herself, "But think about this also: Do you really think that you'll be able to survive the double threat of us and the Underworld? The demons are reforming, and they're coming for you as you've all seen already." She gripped her partner's forearm, vanishing in a swirl of particles that escaped through a gap between the windows.

"Well…" Piper began quietly, looking at the floor, "I can't say it's not tempting." She looked up to be met with the affronted expressions of her two sisters, "Oh, come on! They had a point. Things are just getting far too out of control, and you know we won't survive if we have to deal with a new Source _and_ the Hollow. They're giving us a way out."

"And you _trust_ them?" Phoebe exclaimed, turning around to face her sister and breaking her silence.

"Phoebe, my son could have been _killed _this morning, all because of our destiny and this _stupid_ book!" Piper shouted back, suddenly storming towards the tome's pedestal and kicking it hard, causing it to topple and sending the Book of Shadows to the floor, where it landed perfectly on its back cover.

"Piper!" Paige suddenly barked in a scolding tone, breezing past her eldest sister and picking up the book, putting its altar back up along the way, "I know you're angry right now, but there's no need to take it out on the thing that's kept us alive all this time!" She spat, slamming the tome down onto the pedestal with a hint of anger.

"Paige… don't." Phoebe said softly, shaking her head at her younger sister as she moved towards Piper, "Okay, honey, I'm not saying that it isn't tempting. Hell, Elise wouldn't be lying in the hospital bed, fighting for her life if it weren't for me, but we can't just go and sign magic's death warrant… making rules we had no right to set in the first place?" She suggested cautiously, cringing when Piper looked up, cold fury etched upon her face.

"I think... I think that you two should go."

Paige's eyes bulged as her jaw dropped in shock, "What?"

Piper ran a hand through her hair, biting her lip, "Look, if you guys stay, then I just know that we're going to end up fighting, and saying things we'll regret. I think we just need to think this through without each other first, and then we can make a decision calmly without tearing one another's throats out. Okay?"

"Okay." Phoebe replied quietly, walking slowly over to Paige and taking her hand, giving it a comforting squeeze, "Um… Can you drop me off at the hospital, please?"

"_Fine._" Paige replied indignantly, glaring at Piper before she lifted herself and her sister away from the attic in a swirl of white and blue lights.

* * *

"… That's basically it." Phoebe sighed, folding over the copy of the Bay Mirror and putting it on the nightstand next to Elise's hospital bed. The woman in question lay in a peaceful slumber, one that she hadn't awoken from in over half a day. "I would read you the baseball scores, but I have no idea what they all mean, so you're going to have wake up and read them yourself, you hear me?" Phoebe said angrily, before sighing again and squeezing Elise's hand comfortingly. She had been doing that a lot recently. She felt it was the only thing she could do. "I'm so sorry…"

She felt a hand on her shoulder, and turned round to see Brennan towering over her, balancing Faith on his side while Connor jumped up and down excitedly at his mother's side, having not seen her all day. "Mommy! Mommy! I can count to twenty now!" He shouted loudly, clearly overjoyed at his new knowledge.

It was left to Phoebe to quiet the excited youngster, "Shh… Connor, Elise is very sick right now, so you have to be very quiet and let her rest, okay? Okay." She grinned at him when he nodded and put a finger to his lips, lifting him onto her lap, before looking back up at her husband. "What are doing here? I thought that you had to interview mechanics all day."

"Well, that _was_ the plan." Brennan admitted, bouncing Faith gently on his hip as he talked, "But then I got a call from the day care, saying that nobody had come to pick up Faith, and then just when I was about to call you, I got a call from Connor's kindergarten teacher, asking why no one had picked him up." He raised his eyebrows questioningly, "What happened, Phoebe?"

"I'm sorry. It's just some stuff happened this morning with Piper… We all had a bit of a fight over something, and it's been on my mind ever since. Time must have gotten away from me, sorry." She repeated as Brennan pulled another chair towards the bed so he could sit down and let Faith sit on his lap while they talked. "And Elise's sons can't get here until tonight, so…"

"No." Brennan said flatly. "We're all going home, and you are going straight to bed. You can't function like this, and there's nothing you can do for her by just sitting here." He got no answer, sighing tiredly. He had seen his wife briefly the night before, knowing that she had been a complete wreck due to the guilt she felt. "… This wasn't your fault, Phoebe. You weren't the one who stabbed her. And you made sure that the person who _did_ do it paid for it."

"What does that matter?" She asked, her voice a whisper as she was afraid she wouldn't be able to stop the tears if she spoke at a normal volume. "That warlock was there because of me, Elise was there because of me. If I hadn't been there, if I hadn't my powers… none of this would have happened." She said flatly, turning to Brennan, pursing her lips, "… We've been given an opportunity to give up our powers and secure the world's safety."

"What…?" He breathed.

"It's complicated… but I'm seriously thinking about it now that I'm seeing Elise like this." She turned to him, desperation in her eyes, "What do you think I should do?"

Brennan's eyes widened, "Wow, okay, no. I'm not going to try and influence your decision any way. This is clearly between you and your sisters… But I'll say this though." He turned his body in the uncomfortable chair so he could make proper eye contact with his wife, taking a deep breath. "If you had been able to call Leo or Paige to heal Elise last night, she would have been fine, and you would have spun a little lie about how she tripped and hit her head or something. Do you think you would still be feeling like this if that had happened?"

"Yes." Phoebe replied firmly, before her certainty wavered, "Alright, maybe not as strongly, but she's my boss, she's my friend, how would you like me to feel when she was nearly killed because of me?"

"But she didn't die, Phoebe!" Brennan said, his eyes sparkling with the hope Phoebe saw every time he was trying to cheer her up. "She's alive, honey. She's so alive, and she's fighting this. I mean, c'mon, this is Elise we're talking about." He chuckled with a fond smirk, "This is the woman who slapped me when I called you on your cellphone from the parking lot to pick you up, instead of coming up to your office and escorting you to the car. She's going to be fine!"

Phoebe smiled at the memory, remembering how Elise had slapped him, and then held her hand out to introduce herself. "I just… I don't want her to wake up with nobody there to tell her what happened."

"Tell you what…" Brennan began, taking his car keys out his back pocket and handing them to her, "You and the kids go home. You can put them down for their naps, and then you can go and get some long overdue sleep. I'll stay here and sit with her, that way she's not alone either way… Although I'm sure her kids will get curious when they find a gorgeous looking man at their mother's bedside." He said, smirking in that cocky way that always made Phoebe giggle.

"You forgot to add 'thoughtful' and 'amazing', which surprises me, given the size of your ego." Phoebe teased affectionately, taking Faith from him as Connor jumped off her lap so she could stand. As she passed by the back of his chair, she slipped a hand under Brennan's chin, forcing him to lean back so she should capture his lips in kiss, causing Connor to cringe and cover his eyes as he usually did when his parents showed affection for one another. "Thank you for being you…" She said softly, sweeping her hand over his cheek and through his hair before she left the room.

"Okay then, let's have a look at those baseball scores, shall we?"

* * *

Piper weaved through the thick crowds of P3's dance floor, carrying two bottles of beer and a bottle of Coke. As she tried to get through all the people, she caught her manager's gaze, and gave him an enthusiastic thumbs up with a grin. The DJ that he had booked had certainly filled the club to its maximum capacity, with just enough room for the two guests that Piper was heading to see in the alcove. A part of the eldest Charmed One felt saddened at the fact she no longer spent so much time on the club, but something told her it was because she didn't have to, and it was that fact that made her proud of her achievements.

"Okay, I have a piece offering." She announced, catching Phoebe and Paige's attention as she put all the bottles down on the table. "I was going to bring a white napkin and wave it, but my hands were already full, so…" She trailed off, sitting down on the sofa and looking around the alcove that had been reserved for her and her sisters since the club first opened. "… We don't spend enough time here these days…" She said wistfully, "Okay, come on, sisters! I'm not going to sit here and talk to myself all night, especially after what happened this morning."

It was Paige who broke the silence, reaching for the bottle of Coke, "This better be diet." She said in a snappy tone, but Piper had known her baby sister long enough to see that she was suppressing a smirk.

Phoebe then took her bottle of beer, twisting the cap off and putting it back on the table, "Let's have a toast…" She announced, holding up her drink up in the centre of the table. "To the Power of Three." She said solemnly, making sure each of her sisters clinked their beverages with hers as they echoed her toast.

"You know…" Paige began, circling the top of her bottle with her finger, "I was all ready to come here tonight and tell the two of you to screw yourselves about this decision, pretty much like nine years ago actually. But when I got home from work today, Aidan had basically forgotten what happened this morning, as if _nothing_ had happened! And I know that if we hadn't got that offer, I wouldn't be reacting this way, but… every time I looked at him, all I could see was him bleeding out on the kitchen floor and dying, all because of me. So now, I really don't know what I want…" She admitted, her voice nearly swallowed by the volume of the music booming around the club.

"You're pretty much in the same frame of mind as I am." Phoebe replied sympathetically, "I mean, while doing this would mean that everyone lives… We're witches, our mother was a witch, our kids are witches. Everyone that came before us in our entire line was witch, stretching across centuries! A part of me feels like it would be wrong to give it all up…" With a tired groan, she turned to the only person that hadn't yet voiced their opinion, "What do you think, Piper? How do you feel?"

"I don't know." She replied flatly, closing, "I just… I don't know anymore…"

* * *


	33. Why We Fight

**Why We Fight**

Shalimar Fox had never been a patient person. When she was eight years old, she had wanted to go and see the circus. Her parents, never ones to keep to a schedule, took half an hour to get ready, causing their boisterous daughter to take matters into her own hands and make her own way to the circus. Her way was to jump onto the roofs of cars that were going in the circus' direction, having to make a few high-speed jumps along the way. It ended up that the young feral got bored with fifteen minutes, and returned to her house, where her parents were still getting ready. So as she watched Lexa Pierce shout and curse her way through another contraction, it struck her that going through a nine month pregnancy would be something she would avoid like the plague.

"Shal; put this crystal in that corner of the room, will you?" Phoebe asked politely, throwing the feral a misty white lump of matter which she caught with ease, before turning around and gently tossing it into the corner from her stance at her friend's bedside.

"Phoebe…" Lexa called out wearily as she lent back onto the pillow, her hair how a sweaty mess. "Give it a rest with the damn crystals, will you? The nurses already think I'm crazy after seeing my friend chant Latin while rubbing my stomach."

The middle Charmed One looked extremely offended in turn, "Hey! That was a ritual to promote growth and good health… and help your water break a little faster, as I'm guessing you don't want to go through another three hours of this." She knelt down, placing crystals at the sides of the door, "And I will not cool it with the crystals. If I had my way, you'd be giving birth in a lavender field with a circle of sage around you."

"Oh, you mean a _basket_ of all that herbal crap wasn't enough?" She snapped back, letting out a tired groan as she rolled about uncomfortably in her hospital bed. "Where the hell is Jesse?"

"He went with Brennan to go and find ice for his hand." Shalimar replied, "So, until you get back, you have to crush my hand. And honey, lemme tell you, ferals don't break as easily as moleculars." She warned with cocky smile. "So, have you guys found out if it's a boy or a girl yet?"

Lexa rolled her eyes at the question as Phoebe moved towards her bedside, "Jess has his heart set on a girl. He wants to call her Lilly. I mean, how horrible a name is that?"

"It's not a horrible name." Phoebe protested calmly, not wanting to insight the wrath of a pregnant woman who was naturally edgy even in a normal state. "It's elegant and peaceful. And have you come up with any better ideas?" She grinned knowingly when Lexa looked down at her stomach, pouting, "Yeah, I thought so." The witch said, turning to Shalimar, "I'm gonna go and get a coffee, you want one?"

"Oh no you don't!" Lexa suddenly piped up, glaring at both of her friends. "I haven't had caffeine in nine months, and if you think that you guys are going to stand here and waft that coffee smell in my face, then you've got another thing coming!"

"Um… Lex?" Phoebe began as she backed away towards the door, stopping when she was nearly out in the corridor. "You know this whole thing about bringing a kid into the world?"

"Yeah?"

"You might want to stop at one." She said with a grin, before slipping out of the room and walking briskly down the corridor, ignoring the profanities that where now echoing through the hallway courtesy of Lexa. Phoebe wasn't taking any of her friend's insults personally. She had been throwing them at everyone, but the middle Charmed One knew that once the baby came, she would be extremely apologetic. It was just Lexa's way of dealing with stress. "Okay, two coffees…" She murmured to herself as she put money into the vending machine and put a plastic cup in the hole so it could be filled.

Phoebe was about to press the button, but she was suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling of intense rage. It almost consumed her good mood entirely, leaving her with nothing but an empty feeling. The anger was giving her a splitting headache, along with a tightness in her chest, and she felt the sudden urge to punch something, but she resisted it, pushing back the effects of her empathic powers and getting a hold of herself. She had to find the source of this rage and stop it.

She stumbled down the hall, presuming she looked like an escaped rehab patient to the hospital stuff as she held onto the wall for support. Her search led her up the stairs and into the intensive care unit, to which she only gained entry after altering the perceptions of a few nurses along the way. It was a drastic change to the maternity ward. Instead of the hustle and bustle of many staff, accompanied by the screams of babies, there were very few staff in here and even less noise. This would make it easier to find the source of the rage.

Carefully looking in all the different rooms, Phoebe centered in on the strong feelings she was sensing, and found herself in the presence of what seemed to be a car crash victim. The woman's face was badly burned, and from what Phoebe could see of the rest of the woman's body, it looked like she had been put in a blender. Lacerations covered her arms, making them look stripy. Phoebe imagined that this was what she had looked like after the car crash that had ended with her government capture. It was this sight that made her glad she had very few memories of that time.

She jumped with fright she noticed something at the woman's bedside. The ghostly silhouette of a man was standing over her, staring down at the unconscious woman with milky white eyes. His body was covered in burns, his face scarred beyond recognition, and his clothes had been reduced to rags. There was no mistaking this creature as a ghost. Phoebe had seen cases like this a few times before, where the person has died in a violent way, and has just anger of their death, that they can't separate from their mortally wounded body properly and become a full fledged spirit. He was the source of the anger. "Get away from her!" Phoebe shouted, her hands holding tightly to the doorframe in fear.

He looked up at her, his eyes just as emotionless to her as they were to the woman in the bed. Without saying a word, he suddenly dissolved into a plume of dark mist that flew into the patient's body. Her back arched in her coma as the spirit entered her, before the silence in the room was replaced by the dead screech of the heart monitor, signaling that the woman had flatlined.

Almost instantly, Phoebe found herself in the way of the many medical personnel that suddenly flooded the room. She could only watch in horror as they tried to revive her, her heart sinking when nothing seemed to be working. Making sure that the staff were sufficiently occupied, Phoebe ran out of the unit, bursting through the doors and out into the corridor, never slowing her pace.

She had to find Brennan.

* * *

"…So, next thing I know, I've got a job as senior curator at one of the state's major art galleries!" Paige beamed with pride as she navigated through the playing children and all their toys to make her way to the sofa where Glenn Belland sat, waiting upon the cup of coffee that his friend was carrying, "And it couldn't have come at a better time too. I mean, Aidan makes enough, but not when his wife is unemployed and addicted to shopping channels." She took a gulp of her coffee, "So, enough about me. What's been up with you? April's certainly grown!" She said affectionately to her goddaughter, who was playing on the floor with the twins. The young girl had inherited her mother's complexion, but the rest was completely from her father, with chestnut locks flowing down her small shoulders while her big brown eyes narrowed in curiosity on the doll that was in Melinda's hands.

Glenn laughed warmly at this, taking a sip of his coffee before replying, "You know, oddly enough, I can think of absolutely nothing." He said with a wry smile on his face, "I mean, Run is doing good, Jess is still working on trying to open her own law practice; and April…" He looked over to his daughter, a broad grin spreading over his face. "April's growing up far too fast for my liking."

"Wow, I still can't believe you named your _extreme_ sports store Run." Paige scoffed, thinking that it was such an unimaginative title for what the store carried. "And secondly, I still can't believe that you're living like a normal person. I guess all the rock climbing, scuba diving, hitchhiking, and backpacking got boring after a while, huh?" She said with a smirk.

He chuckled softly in response, "No, not boring… I just grew out of it, that's all. I'm not saying that if the situation arose, I wouldn't do it all again, but right now, my main priority is sitting on the floor, eyeing up your daughter's doll." He said, heaving a sigh, "Besides, this way, I get to prepare the new generation of rock climbers, scuba divers, hitchhikers, and backpackers. It's kinda like how you and your sisters kill demons for the safety of the next generation. I mean, I know what I do doesn't really compare, but…"

"Don't ever say that." Paige said firmly, shaking her head seriously at him, "Don't ever think that what you're doing is pointless in the grand scheme of things. It all matters, trust me."

Before Glenn could lighten the mood with a playful jibe at her seriousness, a tower of fierce flames suddenly flew up from the floor, leaving Maxwell standing there as they licked around him, before completely dissipating. In his arms, there was a young boy resting his head on the fire elemental's shoulder. He was Maxwell's exact double, even down to the style of his hair and the colour of his eyes. "Paige! Thank God!"

"Holy… sugar." Glenn wisely stopped himself, staring at the man and child who had seemingly just survived being caught in a column of fire, a fire that had totally vanished, leaving no burn mark on the carpet. The twins hadn't even bothered to look up, while April was staring in awe in a similar fashion to her father.

Noticing the look of panic on Maxwell's face, Paige quickly set it out to calm it, "It's alright, Max, he knows about magic, although it wouldn't hurt for you to sense for who's in a room next time." She turned her eyes to the child in his arms, smiling warmly when his inquisitive eyes met hers, "Who's this little guy?"

Maxwell looked to the little boy, his face lighting up with pride, "This is Mason." He said, putting the Mason down on the floor so he could stand next to him, hiding timidly behind Maxwell's leg in the process. "He's… well, I guess you could say he's my son. I found him sleeping outside the elevator in my building a few months ago. I asked him if he knew where his parents were and he only told me his name. So I called Social Services so they could deal with him, but they didn't get any more out of him than I did. They're about to take him away, when he screams bloody murder, bites the social worker that's carrying him, runs back to me and refuses to let go of my pant leg. Next thing I know, I'm finalizing an adoption. Who'd have thought it, huh? Me, a father!"

Paige looked at him hesitantly, plastering on a fake smile, "Yeah! …Although I'm a little surprised they allowed you, since you're not married or anything, and your job isn't exactly flexible, if you know what I mean." She said nervously, not knowing how he would react to the slight criticisms she was giving him.

Maxwell sighed as if he had been expecting this from her, "Actually, I switched my job when I got him. I now do administrative stuff down at the port until I get something better. And trust me, if you had seen how much he was screaming, you wouldn't have been able to throw those adoption papers at me fast enough." He gently pushed Mason towards the three little girls, prompting him to cautiously walk into the centre of the living room and look around fearfully, "Anyway, can you please look after him? It's taking Aidan and me longer to hunt the Sylph down than we thought it would, and the babysitter had to leave. He won't be any trouble, I promise."

"Uh… Sure." Paige responded simply, before her eyes widened in shock, "Wait a minute; the _Sylph_ is the new air elemental?"

Maxwell's brow furrowed in confusion, pointing at the witch accusingly, "You know, Aidan got that same look on his face every time we could sense they were close. Just what the hell are they and if they're so much trouble, then why are we trying to find them in the first place?"

"They're three bad ass fairies, that's what they are." Paige replied darkly, "Aidan really should have told you this. I mean, they don't give an audience easily, so you'll probably need to fight them when you do find them."

As if he had heard them, Aidan began to materialize from a puddle that grew upwards from the floor in a tower of water, before the liquid shattered, leaving the elemental standing in its place. Due to the sudden lead he had received about who the new air elemental was, Aidan had spent the last few days either at work or out looking for the Sylph. His clothes were torn and dirty from the places he had searched, and it looked like he hadn't had a proper night's sleep in days. "What are you doing? We need to go before they move again!" He snapped with uncharacteristic anger at Maxwell, before noticing Glenn sitting on the sofa and shooting a questioning glance at his wife, "What's he doing here?" He asked with an ounce of tact, sneering slightly.

"Aidan!" Paige hissed with an anger of her own, "Manners, please?" She asked incredulously, her mouth open in shock at how rude he was being. "Ignore him. He hasn't slept in days."

"I'm in town for the weekend to see my parents and I thought I'd come to see how you guys were doing." Glenn replied coolly, completely ignoring his friend's excuse, "You don't look so good." He said, not seeing Paige's cringe at this comment as she prayed that her husband wouldn't rise to something like that.

Thankfully, Aidan didn't rise to it. In fact, he seemed to completely ignore Glenn's presence from the moment he had asked why he was there. "We need to go _now_, Max." He urged firmly, before vanishing in a column of water that, to April's surprise, didn't totally soak the carpet as it hit the floor.

Maxwell groaned, shaking his head, "He's really quiet, and he's really well behaved." He said, smiling down at Mason as he spoke, "Okay, you be good for Paige, alright?" The elemental asked, not sticking around for the answer as a plume of fire exploded around him and carried him away from the house, leaving Mason with his bottom lip quivering, as if he was on the verge of a tantrum.

"He… doesn't like me very much, does he?" Glenn asked, staring at the spot where Aidan had stood before disappearing. Both of the adults' attention was diverted at the small whimper of a cry from Mason that they both instantly recognized as the start of a full blown screaming fit.

Paige, having dealt with many a toddler's tantrum, managed to preempt this as she practically leapt off the sofa. "You're the high school sweetheart that I've known all my life, and he's my husband. Of _course_ he doesn't like you." She said with a layer of irritation, before quickly turning her attention back to Mason, "Mason, honey, how'd you like some ice cream?" Her eyes widened comically as a large grin spread across her face, trying to entice the toddler into calming down.

It worked. "… Kay." He whispered, still a little unsure, "You got chocolate?"

Paige laughed a little, nodding, "I'm sure we do, and if we don't, then I'll just have to conjure some." She looked past Mason, eyeing the three little girls that were playing with each other in harmony, "Okay, you guys. I'm gonna go and get some ice cream for everyone. You be nice to Mason, okay? Alright." She vanished into the kitchen, sighing with relieve that her plan had worked.

Glenn watched with amusement as the three girls were reluctant to add a boy to their circle, and decided to stare at him with barely concealed curiosity. Once they decided that he wasn't a threat, they went back to playing with their toys. Glenn's eyes widened in shock when the popup book that Melinda was playing with suddenly vanished when a surge of bubbles consumed it, before it reappeared in the same fashion in Emma's small hands. "Not fair!" Melinda shouted, "Mine!"

"Finders keepers!" Emma replied, sticking her tongue out smugly before looking down at the book just in time to see it vanish in a gout of dark red flames from her hands. She looked up, and saw that Mason had his hand out towards her. He moved his palm across until he was gesturing at Melinda, causing the book to materialize in front of her and back into its original owner's hands.

"Thanks!" Melinda grinned, patting the spot of carpet next to her, "You wanna come look?"

Mason's eyes widened in surprise as his cheeks slowly turned red, "Okay…" He responded quietly, walking over to Melinda and sitting down next her, watching intently as she turned the thick pages of the book and did her best to read out the small captions that ran along the bottom.

Glenn had watched this entire exchange with his jaw on the floor, startled that the young boy had not only displayed powers, but he had displayed powers extremely similar to his supposed adoptive father, "So weird…"

* * *

Emma looked through her potion journal with a hint of sad pride in her eyes as she sat calmly on the stool at the Book of Shadow's pedestal. Scribbles were all over her recipes in Paige's handwriting. She had been ready to go and shout vehemently at the witchlighter for defiling something so precious to her, until she realized that the scribbles were actually improvements to the concoctions they had been written on. There were techniques and mixtures that Emma had never mastered, even at her prime. Paige had certainly been doing her homework over these few years.

"Hey," Piper greeted her as she entered the attic, a plastic washing basket under arm, "You got anything? I'm doing whites,"

"Um… No, I did all of mine and Lorna's yesterday, so it's fine." She replied warmly. This was starting to become a nuisance. Both herself and Piper were looking out for their own families, which normally wouldn't never be a problem for people, but when this was happening as they all shared the same house, you couldn't move in one direction without stepping on someone's toes. Emma knew that Piper felt the exact same way, but due to her not being able to get a job, she was unable to move out, and it was causing between a silent tension between the two older women of the house. Combining all of that with Piper's resentment towards her for suddenly swooping in and becoming Lorna's primary caretaker after all these years, and the mood in the Halliwell Manor was less than pleasant. "Piper…" She called out as the witch was about to leave, causing her to turn around, "What… What were things like when I died?"

This question clearly caught Piper off guard, as her hold on the washing basket under her arm faltered for a second as she turned back around to face Emma, "Uh… Okay, random. Where did that come from all of a sudden?"

"I dunno… I was curious."

Sensing that this may take a while, Piper walked deeper into the room, setting the basket down on a nearby table as she headed towards Emma, folding her arms tightly across her chest. "Well… Lorna would not stop screaming, Paige had to go on a little bit of an alcohol detox after she had a relapse with the stuff, and everyone was basically all over the place. We all kinda got back on our feet when Aidan and Paige got back together, and we were fine after that, but… the hole you left in our lives was bigger than the hole in your chest." She chuckled a little, before cringing at Emma's look of discomfort, "Oh God, I'm sorry. Was that a little too…?"

"No." Emma immediately replied, "I mean, if it had been my first time dying, then yeah. But seeing as how I got myself killed _again_, I think the jokes are allowed." She pursed her lips tightly, unsure of how to approach the issue that had been bugging her for months. "It pissed you off, didn't it? When I just suddenly came back after all that time…"

"What?" Piper exclaimed, before succumbing to the redhead's knowing glare, "Alright, it did a little, but it wasn't because I didn't want you around or anything, it was just… Well, you had spent a few months with Lorna before you died, but I had been her mother figure for two and a half years. Then, you came back and I just got pushed out of the picture. And I know she's not my daughter, but…"

"I know." Emma said, sparing Piper the pain of having to say her feelings out loud. "But trust me, Piper. Lorna sees you a lot differently then you think she does. I'm her mother when it comes to genetics, but you… well, just don't ever think that you've been pushed out of the picture, okay? I know for a fact that you haven't." She paused for a few seconds before continuing, heaving a sigh as she did, "Being Lorna's mother is about the only thing left for me here. I mean, Paige has surpassed me when it comes to potions, and Phoebe may not realize it, but she's become far more powerful than I am… I guess I'm just trying to tell you not to take so personally, okay?"

"Alright." Piper responded softly, smiling coyly, "And while we're on the subject, I'll ask again: You got anything? I'm doing whites."

Emma looked down guiltily, "It's all in the hamper at the bottom of my bed. Lorna's too."

"I knew it!" Piper said with an impish grin, turning around and picking up her washing basket, heading towards the attic door with it back under her arm. She was about to leave and go down the stairs, when she turned around and surveyed Emma with a kind glance, smiling warmly, "Emma… You're still needed around here, regardless of Phoebe's powers and Paige knowing her way around a hemlock root." She said softly, before leaving the room.

Emma smiled wryly at the door; looking down at the page she had open in the Book of Shadows, thankful that Piper hadn't noticed, "Empty words…" She whispered sadly, tapping the page with her index finger a few times as she contemplated what it the tome said, starting at the top of the page.

_Sending A Spirit To The Afterlife_

* * *

"I can't believe you got your hand bandaged up." Brennan scoffed as Jesse came out of the examination room with white gauze wrapped around his hand, wincing from the residual pain of Lexa nearly crushing his fingers during one of her contractions. Faith, who had been in her father's arms during this, immediately responded to Brennan's grin with a loud giggle of childish glee.

Connor, however, looked up at the bandage on his godfather's arm with amazement. In his mind, the bigger the bandage, the bigger the courage. "Wow, Uncle Jesse! How'd that even happen?" He asked, only remembering Jesse walking from the room where Lexa was, holding his arm in pain while Brennan followed, chuckling all the way.

"It happened because I didn't use my powers, and because your Auntie Lexa is freakishly strong." Jesse said wryly, mentally slapping himself once again for not thinking of massing out his hand every time Lexa went to crush it. He turned on Brennan, a cocky smile on his face, "And I don't see what you're laughing about. When Connor was born, Phoebe crushing your hand reduced you to tears. You just tried to cover it up with the joy of your kid being born."

Brennan remained silent for a moment before responding, "Touché." He replied humbly.

"There you are!" Phoebe suddenly boomed as she strode down the hallway. "I've been looking for you guys all over the place. We have a major problem on our hands."

"Are Lexa and the baby okay?"

The Charmed One's eyes suddenly widened in realization at what she had said, "Oh God, no, it's nothing to do with that. Sorry, I forgot the number one rule in these situations is to not start a sentence with 'We have a major problem on our hands.' Unless its relevant. No, they're fine, but we have an extremely angry ghost on our hands. It nearly killed a woman up the ICU, but they managed to get a pulse back and she's fine for now."

"Did anyone see what the ghost did?" Brennan, his mind immediately going to the risk of exposure and about what had happened last time.

"No, it just kinda… entered her, then her heart just stopped beating." Phoebe explained, shaking her head in annoyance, "And it was really powerful too. Ghosts are usually repelled by an electric current, but the doctors used paddles on the woman and it took three tries to expel it from her. He also looked really creepy, which always a sure sign of a pissed off ghost."

"Okay, so what do we do?" Jesse asked, placing his hands on hips as if he was ready for action.

"Well, we…" Phoebe began, gesturing to Brennan and herself, "… are going to and deal with this. You are going to get back to Lexa before she starts suspecting something's wrong and goes crazy. Take the kids back to the room with you." She ordered, prompting her husband to hand Faith over to Jesse, who surveyed the infant with wide eyed fear the moment she came into his arms, "Alright, you just sit back and try to relax, we'll have this done before your baby's born. I promise." She tapped Brennan lightly on the arm, "Let's go." She said, turning around to start walking back down the corridor.

Brennan was on his way to follow her, when he noticed Jesse's stunned look at Faith as he got her into a comfortable position on his hip, "Are you okay?"

"Yeah…" Jesse murmured, turning to his friend and smiling, "I guess the whole baby thing is just hitting home now, that's all." He replied with a weak laugh, taking Connor's hand and beginning to walk in the opposite direction down the corridor, balancing his newfound responsibilities while preparing for the responsibilities that were on their way.

* * *

"So… this is homely." Bridget commented nervously as she looked around the magical café. To be honest, she had enough trouble dealing with the fact that she had the power of camouflage, so seeing all these magical creatures in one place, acting like normal people would in a normal café, was a little daunting. She was particularly interested in a person at the counter. He was a child by the looks of things, and was dressed like a scarecrow. The feral inadvertently let out a gasp of surprise when the being turned around to talk someone, revealing that underneath his worn hat, there was nothing but darkness where two bright yellow eyes shone outwards.

Pamela, catching her new friend's shock, turned around in their booth to see what she was looking at, "Oh, don't worry about Paul. He's a poor little kid whose parents were killed a few years ago for their powers. He's a really rare creature, because he's one of the few living things that are made of nothing but magic. Oh, and he's been scamming tourists since he was five, the little cutie." She said fondly, turning back around to the three people she was sitting with, "Oh, here's comes Knave."

"Okay, what canna get you gals?" Knave asked, clicking her pen as she readied herself to take the orders.

"I think…" McKenzie began, looking at the menu with a frown, "I think I'll go with the Boiled Bunyip with just a light sprinkling of fairy dust. The last time, there was way too much."

"I will have the Mandrake Root Soup with some bread on the side." Jordann replied, handing her menu back to Knave. "Just a medium portion though, because last time, the large portion made me glow in dark for two nights."

"Chimera Burger, medium rare." Pamela said flatly.

"And what about you, darlin'?" Knave asked warmly, turning her gaze onto Bridget as she went white from the images her mind was creating from the descriptions of her friends' orders.

"Um… I'll just have a salad, thank you." She responded quietly, handing her menu back with a beaming smile before clasping her hands over the table, trying to stay her nerves as the nymph walked off with all their orders. "So, have you talked to Keith about him leaving yet?"

Pamela looked up from the table, glaring at the blonde, "No… And I'm not going to. I'm just gonna keep avoiding him and wait for him to leave. Dean said that he's letting us keep the apartment, so as long as my little niece of nephew has a nice place to live during its first steps in life, then I don't really care what Keith does."

"Am I the only one that smells bullshit?" McKenzie asked with comical raised eyebrows.

"No," Jordann smirked back, "But then again, it could always be those three trolls that are sitting near the door."

Pamela sighed tiredly, moving her finger in a circular motion on the table, "Look, you guys are making far too much of this. Keith and I broke up months and months ago. We're just good friends. I mean, sure, it'll be sad to see him go, before I won't be heartbroken over the fact that I'll probably never see him again. Friends drift apart, and I'd rather have it happen that way than risk falling out with him before he leaves."

"But don't you guys have a lot of history?" Bridget piped up innocently, "I mean, you were together for, what, a year? I would have thought that you would want to see him as much you could, rather than the opposite." She pursed her lips when Pamela looked towards the window, ignoring her gaze, "Before I moved here, I had a great boyfriend back in Montana. I told him I was leaving in a week, and I never saw him again in that week. It's partly because of him, but mostly, it was just me being stupid."

"Look, Pam, the two of you have been dancing around one another for months now. You both regret what happened, and it's just sheer stubbornness that's keeping you apart now." McKenzie advised, shaking her head at the stupidity of the whole situation. "Trust me, if Trent was leaving in a month, I would be making every second count, if you know what I mean!"

The women around her grimaced at her comment, "Yeah, I think even the germ molecules on the table know what you mean." Jordann replied, swatting her friend with a napkin.

"As does Trent's sister, and ew." Pamela added with a sneer, "Okay, I'll talk to him if it'll shut you guys up, because I'm sick of my non-existent relationship with Keith dominating all of our conversations." She chose to ignore the collective eye roll from her three friends when she described the relation as non-existent, "So, can we please just have a nice, clam afternoon?"

* * *

"Brennan!" Phoebe screamed as her husband was thrown into a cabinet containing medical supplies, causing the glass panes to shatter with a loud crash as he fell to the floor, luckily without any pieces of glass protruding from his back as he quickly recovered from the attack. "Are you okay?" She asked, gently helping him back up to his feet before turning her attention back to the ghost. "Why are you doing this? Tell me!" She demanded, a psionic blast hovering above her eyes as she strode forward calmly.

The ghost narrowed his milky eyes, "So… lonely." He groaned, a flash enveloping his body for a quick second and briefly giving a glimpse of what the man looked like without his heavy injuries. He looked so normal, with a fair hair, pale green eyes, and an expression of confused fear on his face, before reverting back into his ghastly state.

"This isn't the way!" Phoebe pleaded, diffusing her psionic blast, "You have to move on, you can't go around killing people, especially when I know that you are good person that's just struggling with all this." She could tell that he was just confused and angry with his death, as if he had been a malicious spirit, she would have sensed nothing from him in the first place.

"More power…" He muttered, apparently unaware of Phoebe's presence as he floated forward, the cuts on his face beginning to bleed as a spiritual wind gathered in the room, "I need… more power!" He boomed, whooshing towards the witch at a fantastic speed and going right through her. As it happened, Phoebe felt the normal chill of when a ghost went through her, but every muscle in her body suddenly tensed as she was assaulted by a premonition.

_It began with a harsh white glare that faded away, revealing itself to be the reflection of a street lamp on a car's windshield as it passed by. It seemed that the same man, who was now terrorizing the hospital in spirit form, was the same man that was driving the car, laughing merrily at something as he turned to the woman that was sitting in the passenger side. It was the woman from the ICU. Despite the heavy injuries that riddled their current forms, they were still easily recognizable._

_The pleasant ease between the two was violently interrupted when a high pitched screech nearly deafened the middle Charmed One as she looked on in horror, watching as the man tried to regain control of his car before Phoebe's vision was suddenly blinded once again, by a sudden explosion of fierce light and unbearable heat. She was suddenly assaulted by brief stabs of excruciating fear, before everything faded to black._

Phoebe was shocked out of her premonition with a thud as she found herself on the floor next to the wall. Her head was killing her, and Brennan was nothing but a blur as he rushed towards her. "Phoebe!" His voice echoed in her mind, before her vision focused and she could see him properly, his face fraught with worry. "Are you okay? What the hell happened?"

"… I was about to ask the same thing myself." Phoebe murmured to herself, pressing the heels of her hands into her temples as she tried to collect herself. "How did I end up on the floor?"

"That ghost…" Brennan said, shaking his head angrily as he looked up at the ceiling, "He went through you, then the next thing I know you're flying straight into the wall." He frowned at her apparent apathy to this information, before recognizing the expression that his wife had, "What did you see?" He asked quietly, cupping her face and making her look directly into his eyes.

"The ghost." She replied, "He's married to the woman that he nearly killed up in the ICU. They were in a car crash. He died, and she barely survived… It all makes sense now!" The witch boomed excitedly, getting up to her feet, "When people die violent and unexpected deaths, they can't accept it as spirits and it doesn't allow them to fully detach from their dead body. That's why he still has the injuries that he sustained when he was alive…"

"Okay, slow down." Brennan urged calmly, "I didn't have the vision; I'm not as up to speed as you are." He said with a fond smirk.

She smirked back triumphantly, "I'm getting to that… In this form, ghosts are so detached from their formal selves, that only the strongest emotions can affect their judgment. In this case, it's this guy's fear of being alone, and the love for his wife. It's all consuming, and it's keeping him here."

"So what do we do?"

Phoebe bit her lip, thinking over the information that they had and pacing into the middle of the room. Her eyes widened when she came to a conclusion, "He said he wanted power." She said urgently, spinning on Brennan. "His emotions are the only thing that's keeping him here, but they're gonna burn out eventually due to the passion he feels them. He'll vanish into the afterlife, but he doesn't to go without his wife, so he's gonna need more power to keep him here for a bit longer…" Her breath hitched when she came to a conclusion, terror striking her face, "Lexa and the baby!"

* * *

Piper heaved a sigh as her eyes darted back and forth between the Book of Shadows and the pad she was writing on. She had started doing this up the attic, but she decided that it was far too quiet up there, and had come down into the dining room where the natural light was much better, and she was in the company of Lorna. "Hey, Lorny, wanna switch?" She asked cheekily, looking at how the tiny redhead had spread herself out at the table. Crayons were scattered over the surface while she worked intently on one drawing, apparently not even registering Piper's presence at the table. "Wise girl…" She groaned, going back to her work.

The growing noise of footsteps on the stairs gave away Emma's impending entrance as she came down into the dining room, smiling kindly at its two occupants, "Hey!" She beamed, "What are you doing?"

"Note taking." Piper responded bitterly, "Something I thought that I would never have to do once I left college." She smiled weakly at Emma's confused expression, "I'm looking for stuff that will help us defeat the Hollow. Or even Diam and Tyola. I mean, if we can't kill them, what chance to have against their boss?"

"Oh, you'll get there. I'm sure of it." Emma said confidently, grinning at Piper as she sat down at the end of the table. "Why are you looking at the book anyway? I would have thought that you know it front to back after all this time."

"You'd think that, but new stuff gets added all the time without us even realizing." Piper responded, turning a page and shaking her head dismissively at it before continuing through the book. "Where'd you get the sudden burst of faith anyway? You should share it, everyone's been kinda down lately, if you haven't noticed."

"Oh, I've noticed. And I find it stupid."

Piper's head shot up, surveying Emma's calm expression with wide eyes, "What?"

"It's stupid." She repeated simply, "You guys are getting all stressed and bent out of shape over a deal that your _enemies_ struck with you. I mean, sure, the whole thing may have raised some issues that were thought to be forgotten, but you guys didn't seem to have a problem until you were given a way out. I wouldn't be surprised if those demons had been paid off by Diam and Tyola to deliberately rattle you."

"We thought of that, but they were independent demons, so there's no way of finding out if that's what happened." Piper replied sadly, "Look, Emma, it's just not as simple as forgetting everything and putting a smile back on my face. Chris could have been killed in that stunt, all because of our powers."

"Yeah, he looked real traumatized playing baseball with Wyatt and Leo in the backyard this morning." She said sarcastically, before frowning and looking around the ground floor of the house. "Where is Leo anyway? He was here earlier."

"Community college." Piper answered, not looking up. "He's brushing up on his carpentry skills so he can get that little piece of paper to say that he's qualified to put a few shelves up when he gives up his powers."

Emma smirked at this information, "Oh, really? So, we have you sitting here researching ways on how to vanquish the Hollow, and we have Leo out preparing for the perfect life you'll have _after_ you vanquish the Hollow. Maybe I'm getting my wires crossed, but these don't sound like the actions of a woman who's giving up the fight." She stood up as she spoke, causing Piper to look up to her with a look of realization across her face. "Look, just take my advice for once. See this through to the end. No one knows how it's all going to come to a close, which means there's still a fifty fifty chance of you getting that life you've wanted for so long. And Piper, if you and your sisters are good at anything, it's beating the odds. Even when they're against you."

Piper smiled slightly at this. It was one of the few genuine smiles she'd had recently, "Okay, where did this little pep talk come from all of a sudden?"

Emma shrugged, placing her hands on the back of the chair, "Just sharing my faith." She replied with a grin, beginning to walk around the table and go towards the kitchen, "Alright, I'm gonna go out." She said, stopping behind Lorna's chair and placing a tender kiss on the top of the child's forehead, stroking her fiery hair before she stood up properly.

"Really? I was just about to start dinner." Piper said, closing the Book of Shadows over and standing up also.

Emma smiled weakly at the eldest Charmed One, her expression cracking slightly as she tried to maintain it. "… I'll be back in time." She said softly, before heading into the kitchen and out of the back door towards the driveway.

Piper's attention was diverted all of a sudden when Wyatt and Chris flew down the stairs, the latter of whom was holding a handheld games console as he bolted through the dining room with Wyatt hot on his trail. "Chris! Give it back!" He yelled as his little brother ducked under the table and scrambled out the right side, running into the conservatory as the elder of the two ran right after him. Chris was about to escape into the living room, when Wyatt threw out his hand, "Drawer thing!" He yelled, causing a large cabinet at the side of the door to vanish in a swirl of orbs, before reappearing across the archway, blocking Chris' way.

"That's not fair! You used magic!" Chris protested, pouting as he handed the game over to Wyatt who smirked triumphantly over his victory.

"That's what you get when you _steal_." He said smugly, turning the console back on and resuming the game he had been playing before Chris had taken it from him in the first place.

All the while Piper had been watching with an amused glint in her eye. This grew into a smile when she saw Wyatt reluctantly hand over the game to Chris, prompting the younger boy to burst into a smile that was similar to her own. She looked down at the Book of Shadows sorrowfully, touching the silver triquetra that was raised in the cover before she picked it up and tucked it her arm, breathing a sigh of relief as she finally understood what she had to do.

* * *

"I'm still not sure that we should go through with this." Jesse said darkly, holding Lexa's hand as she wearily laid her head back against the pillow. "I mean, it's just too risky. We're putting the baby in danger, not to mention everyone else in this room." He said, frowning at Brennan for relaying Phoebe's plan to them while she had went off with Shalimar to prepare.

"Look, Jess, I'm not happy about it either, but it's better we nip this thing in the butt before Lexa has to start pushing and is left vulnerable to an attack. It's after her powers, and the baby's. And it won't stop at anything to get it." He said, sitting down in one of the overstuffed chairs and staring pensively at the wall.

"Jesse…" Lexa murmured, her hair now even more of a tangled mess than it was that morning. "At this point… I don't care what happens, I just want this baby outta me!" She snapped, going to crush his hand again to vent her frustrations. Luckily, Jesse was prepared, and silently massed his hand out to protect it from injury.

"Okay, I got what we need." Phoebe announced as she walked back into the room with Shalimar slinking in behind her and standing at the foot of the bed. "Okay, we need to start now. When you've got one of these…" She waved the small bottle she had in her hand, "Ghosts tend to get very angry. Are you guys ready for this? It could let pretty intense." She asked the couple softly.

"Just do it already…" Lexa said tiredly, closing her eyes and preparing herself for what was to come.

"Shal?"

"Yes." Shalimar replied, not taking her eyes off Lexa as she spoke.

"Alright then…" Phoebe said, pursing her lips as she closed the door. "Here we go." Bending down, she carefully picked up one of the crystals that were at the door. A pale blue glow illuminated the walls before fading away, signaling that the barrier of protection had been broken. Suddenly, the lone fluorescent light in the middle of the ceiling began to flicker, blanketing the group in darkness in short intervals. "Aw, crap!"

Shalimar had lit up with an unearthly glow. There was a bright flash, before the feral collapsed to the floor with a thud, leaving the ghost standing in her place. It had possessed her to gain entry into the room, and could only leave her body once the crystal had been removed from the perimeter. Jesse flew from his chair, his instincts overriding his common sense as he went to attack the ghost, only for it to raise an arm and send him flying through the air, hitting the wall and smacking his head off the floor as he landed.

"No!" Phoebe shouted as the ghost flew towards Lexa, who didn't even have time to react as it entered her. The mutant took a few desperate gulps of air, before her head flopped to the side as she fell unconscious due to her having her heart stopped. "Brennan, do something!" The middle Charmed One urged him as they surrounded Lexa, "Use your powers!"

Hesitating, Brennan held his shaky hands over Lexa's chest, sighing angrily when nothing happened, "I can't! I have been able to use my powers since…"

"Brennan! Come on! She's going to die if you don't!" Phoebe pleaded, watching as the colour began to disappear from Lexa's cheeks from the lack of oxygen, "Please!"

Taking a deep breath, Brennan attempted to calm his nerves and clenched his fists together. "C'mon…" He murmured to himself, scrunching up his eyes and not seeing the small lick of voltage travel up his forearm, "Come on!" He bellowed, suddenly opening his hands over Lexa and releasing two powerful bolts of electricity into her body. The molecular's back arched as the current flooded her system, causing a white glow to be ripped from her body and reappear as the ghost at the foot of the bed.

"That's enough." Phoebe said firmly, taking the top off the essence bottle and causing the spirit to burst into a spray of tiny white lights that traveled like a river into the small bottle. She than slammed the lid back on and stared at the struggling essence within the magical glass, "Grieving spirit, I release thee, ascend to the above, so mote it be…" She chorused softly, watching at the glow in the bottle vanished in a flash of white light, sending the ghost into the afterlife.

The lighting began to return to normal as Jesse and Shalimar slowly pulled themselves to their feet. "What happened?" The feral asked curiously, "The last thing I remember, I was talking to Lexa and then… It's all a blur."

"You were possessed, honey." Phoebe said sympathetically, going towards her friend and slinging an arm around her shoulders, "But don't worry, it happens to best of us."

"Uh… guys?" Lexa said shakily, trying to prop herself up and get into a comfortable, "This baby is coming… _Now_!"

* * *

Pamela opened the door to her apartment with a tired sigh, laying down her shopping bags the moment she crossed the threshold and heading straight for her own room, enjoying the gentle ambience of the one dim light that was on, "So, I certainly had an interesting day." She said with smirk, taking off her jacket, "You know, I usually think that Jordann and Mac are really perceptive. I don't know enough about Bridget yet, but she seems to be too, so it's hilarious that they still haven't figured this out yet! I mean, they just kept berating me all day! I was struggling to keep a straight face for most of time. Anyway, how was your day?"

"Eh, pretty boring." Keith replied as she sat down on the bed, getting up from his lying position and kissing the back of her neck, "I was just finalizing some stuff before I leave next month." He said, sitting down and running his fingers up and down her bare arm, "I still can't believe you haven't told that we've been back together since last week. I mean, if anything, I would have thought you'd want to avoid the annoying conversations."

"But where's the fun in that?" Pamela replied with a smirk, before putting her arms around Keith's neck and kissing him intensely, biting his bottom lip seductively as she pulled away. "I can keep a secret… Can you?"

* * *

"Aw, now you see what good a shave and a shower can do for a person?" Paige smirked as Aidan came down the stairs in a baggy white t-shirt and black sweatpants. Small scars riddled his arms and his face and Paige instantly felt a pang of guilt for being mad at him all day as he lay out on the couch, resting his head on her lap. "Do you what me to heal you?" She asked, putting her hand through his hair soothingly.

"Nah, I'm fine. The Sylph are a bunch of bitches though." He replied, sighing wearily as he was slowly drifting to sleep in his position. "It should be very fun to work with them at least…"

Paige laughed a little, continuing to stroke his hair and look down at him with sorrow filled eyes, "I was afraid for you today, you know. When Maxwell told me that you were going after the Sylph, I thought they may have killed you if you got too close…"

Aidan's eyes instantly flashed open at this, looking at his wife and shaking his head, "Is this about the darklighter thing again? Ow!" He yelped when she suddenly tugged his hair, frowning darkly down at him.

"Yes, it's about the darklighter thing." Paige said angrily, before going back to strumming her fingers through his hair gently, "I don't get why you're not taking it as seriously as I am. If I just been a second slower, you wouldn't even be here right now. Hell, if I hadn't been there, you would have been perfectly fine. I nearly got you killed."

He sighed and closed his eyes again, "You know, at the risk of getting my hair pulled again, I'll tell you that every time you go out, hunting some demon, I don't worry at all." She felt her grip a part of his locks, presumably waiting for him to finish before deciding if she should follow, "It's because I know that it's not the end for us." He said simply, "You're not gonna be killed by some demon, and I'm not gonna be killed in a darklighter ambush over breakfast. It's just that simple."

"But how can you be so sure?" She asked quietly, like a child. "I mean, we deal with death on a daily basis. It creeps up on everyone, there's no way of telling when you're definitely going to die."

"It's not about having cold, hard evidence, Paige. It's about knowing in your gut when you wake up every morning that you're going to be doing the exact same thing the next day. So just worry a little less, alright?" He took her free hand and grinned up at her, "I'm not going anywhere."

Paige grinned back at same, shaking her head, "Actually, you are. Tomorrow, you're going down to the hotel Glenn's staying at and you're going to apologize to him for being such a jackass!"

Aidan's face immediately fell. He went to open his mouth to protest, but decided against it. "Fine… I'm too tired to argue." He groaned, getting up off the sofa and shuffling towards the stairs, "Good night." The elemental called as he climbed the stairs, turning around and grinning at his wife, "I'll see you in the morning. That's a promise."

"Okay." She replied, smiling bashfully to herself as she brought her knees up to her body and hugged herself for a few minutes, before a series of frantic knocks and rings of the doorbell caught her attention. "Who the hell calls at this hour?" She thought out load, wearily getting up from the sofa and going to the door, surprised to find Piper when she opened it, allowing her oldest sister to barrel into the house. "What's up with you?" She asked.

"Emma!" She shouted, a thunderous expression over her features as she waved a white piece of paper around, "She's done it again! She's left!"

"What?" Paige asked incredulously, snatching the letter from her sibling's hands and beginning to read it at high speed. "Oh my God…"

_Dear Piper,_

_It seems appropriate that you should be the one to find this first, so I'll address it to you. I'm really sorry to say goodbye like this again, but in these past months, I've come to realize that I longer have a place here. It's not your fault, it's not anyone's fault, actually. You guys moved on when I was away, and you became a better mother to Lorna than I ever could. I feel like I've been walking around in a haze, living a half-life, when really, I've lived for longer than I deserve. How people would kill for a second and third chance at life? Probably everyone, I imagine. I've accomplished so much, and I'm so glad that I spent these last years with such amazing people. Take care of Lorna for me._

_Apologies,_

_Emma_

* * *

Lexa grinned down at the baby girl in her arms, fighting back the tears of joy as she gazed upon her very own daughter. She couldn't wait to see her eyes, as she had yet to opened them. The mutant had a feeling that they would probably be the most beautiful part of her child, "So, who do you think she looks like the most?" She asked Jesse softly, who was sitting up next to her on the bed with his arm her shoulders.

"Who are you kidding?" He responded with a smile, "She's absolutely gorgeous. It's all from you."

"Yeah," Lexa said, chuckling a little, pursing her lips and smiling down at her child, "You know, I've been thinking, and… maybe Lilly isn't such a horrible name after all."

Jesse's face lit up, "Seriously?"

"Uh huh. I don't know if it's the epidural or just the natural high, but I think it fits with her." Lexa bounced the little girl slightly, keeping her clam, "What do you think about that name, Lilly?"

"Look at them…" Phoebe murmured softly at the doorway to Brennan, who joined her, "They haven't even realized that we're standing here… off in their own little world." She whispered, grinning from ear to ear with the joy she felt from both herself and the two proud parents, "We've done a lot of good today, haven't we?" She asked, already knowing the answer.

"I would say so." Brennan replied at the same volume, leaning on the opposite side of the doorframe and folding his arms, "Although that plan was really risky. I mean, what I hadn't been to get my powers to work? Lexa and the baby would have died, and Jesse would probably have killed both of us."

"Yeah, I was so afraid we weren't going to pull it off!" She admitted, smiling nervously at Brennan's affronted expression, "But we did. Let's just focus on that. Besides, I knew that you would be able to use your powers. I mean, sure, the cause of the block was grief for the first few months, but the last couple of weeks, the only thing that's stopping you has been yourself." She grinned at him, "You saved the day."

"I guess I did." He laughed softly, looking out of the window in the corridor, "It's been a while since I've felt this good about a situation like this, you know?"

Phoebe nodded in response, "I know what you mean. This whole thing reminded me what I loved about being a witch in the first place. It was never about killing the bad guy or messing around with magic. It was moments like this! Saving innocents and knowing that I was responsible for their happiness, knowing that they would be safe because of my actions. I'd forgotten about it because all magic has been for me recently is a series of events connected by bouts of crippling pain and guilt… It's so weird that after fourteen years, I can still get a buzz from doing this."

"Kinda makes you think about that offer you were given, huh?" Brennan smirked, holding out his hand and letting Phoebe slip her smaller palm into his as she nodded with a small smile.

"Definitely."

* * *

Emma took in a deep breath as she stood atop the Golden Gate Bridge. She looked down on the twinkling lights of the city before her and for some reason; she couldn't keep the smile off her face. In the past six months, it was odd that just before her death was the time she felt the most alive for a long time. Her fingers were tingling, her mind was buzzing. She was even shaking a little. It was absolutely exhilarating. She was even tempted to let out a small giggle.

"You selfish bitch…"

Emma spun around to see Paige glaring heatedly at her from the other side of the beam. "What the hell do you think you're doing?" The witchlighter exclaimed, striding across the dark red metal, "Piper's worried _sick_ trying to find you, but I figured you'd come here. Hell, after everything that's happened to us, coming to this bridge is just a giant cliché for this family."

"Paige… I can't stay here anymore." Emma said simply, shrugging her shoulders, "I don't know what else to say."

"You could start by telling me why!" Paige demanded, close to tears as she stepped closer to her best friend. "You can't leave; you have Lorna to think about! How do you think she'll survive without you?"

"She got along fine until I showed up. All I did was confuse her, she didn't know what to do between me and Piper, but deep down…" She trailed off, "Do you know what it's like to know for a _fact_ that your own daughter loves someone else like a mother more than you? I do. A few days ago, when a demon attacked, Lorna ran to Piper instead of me. Piper was the one she wanted to comfort her when she fell and scraped her knee outside the Manor, and Piper is the one that she wants to tuck her in at night." She turned back to the skyline, tears now in her eyes, "I was never supposed to come back this time… I shouldn't have. All I've done is get in the way of things that I had no control over and it's just left me more hurt."

Paige stood silent, struck dumb by these revelations. She began to wonder why Piper hadn't mentioned such things to her, but then she realized that Piper probably didn't even realize it was happening. After years of being Lorna's mother, having Lorna come to her for comfort and assurance was just something she was used to, "… Now I don't know what to say."

"You say goodbye." Emma replied, "Actually, _we_ say goodbye. And properly this time." She took both of Paige's hands, smiling at her, "I want you to know that you… have been the most amazing person that I have ever met in _any_ life. You have a strength that I can only dream of. You've survived so much, and if it wasn't for you, I wouldn't be standing here today, happy with everything that I've done in my life. Without you, I wouldn't have a magnificent daughter to continue my legacy, without you… I would have nothing."

"If you hadn't noticed, I'd be in a similar situation if weren't for you." Paige replied, managing to keep her composure, "If it wasn't for you, I probably would have got that abortion and Aidan and I would have never got back together…"

Emma laughed at this, "Oh, you two would have gotten there. Trust me."

Paige tried to return the light hearted mood, before her face crumpled under trying to hold back her weeping, "God! You always think you know what you'll say in a situation like this… and now I don't know what to say…"

"There's only one thing to say…" Emma said softly, backing away from her best friend as she slowly began to emit a pale pink glow. She once again felt that rush of life as pink light enveloped her while Paige watched on, confused. The light had nearly completely consumed her as a satisfied smile spread across her face, "Goodbye… And don't _ever_ give up." She whispered, before her glowing form suddenly blew up into thousands upon thousands of rosy pink orbs that dispersed among the atmosphere, before fading away in the ether.

"Goodbye…"

* * *


	34. From Above You It Devours, Part I

**From Above You It Devours: Part 1**

Annabelle ignored her hair constantly hitting her face as another gust of wind battered her body. The wind was particularly aggressive tonight, and she had absolutely no idea why. On top of the Golden Gate Bridge, one always expected there to be some fierce gales, but they were extremely vicious tonight. So vicious, in fact, that Annabelle rethought her position of sitting on the edge of the giant red beam and got up, walking into the centre so she was in a safer place. It was better here. The sunset had been getting in her eyes anyway.

She was momentarily startled when a plume of angry flames erupted from the metallic red surface of the beam she was standing on. From within it, a pale skinned demon dressed in grey rags appeared, stumbling slightly as he was hit by an unexpected gust of wind and nearly completely losing his balance, "Careful now," Annabelle purred with a smirk, "I wouldn't want you going over the edge before I get my money." She remained silent when all the evil being did was sneer at her, "What took you so long? It's not like transportation is a problem."

"I'm a Luna Demon." He snapped, pointing at the crescent moon tattoo that was emblazoned on his forehead, "I couldn't come up to the surface until the sun had gone down enough." He explained, squinting at the fading sunlight with disgust, "Did you take care of the Sols?"

"Seeing as how you weren't attacked and slaughtered at dawn, I think that's a yes. Now, where's my money?"

The demon's jaw clenched as he tried to read the mercenary and see if she was lying. She had a reputation in the Underworld for getting the job done, and in the summer, where the days were longer, his kind was being decimated by the Sol Demons and bringing in outside help had been a necessity. "Ten grand for ten demons." He said, a large sack appearing out of nowhere in his hand before he threw it down in between them, a tinkering sound breaking up the sound of howling wind as it hit the metal. "It's all there."

Eyeing the creature with caution, Annabelle chuckled to herself as she stepped forward to inspect her payment. Warring clans was where the big money was in this business. One week, a clan is paying you to destroy their enemies, the next week; the other clan is paying you double to destroy the previous clan. It was a never ending cycle of profit to her, "Gold coins in a sack? I'm more of a 'cash in a briefcase' kinda girl, but it'll do." She said, picking up the sack with both hands and smiling, "Pleasure doing business with you."

The demon opened his mouth to respond, when his speech was suddenly replaced by a gargled choking as he struggled to breathe. Annabelle jumped in surprise when fire burst out from all sides behind him, as if it was being blasted into his back at a high velocity. Within seconds, the assault had vanquished him, allowing the jet of flames to fly through his falling ashes and towards Annabelle, who was able to burst into a stream of particles and dodge the blast before it hit her.

"I think you'll find that that money is _mine_."

The blonde rematerialized, shaking her head with contempt at the man who was now standing across from her. "That's probably a good thing." She spat back, dropping the sack of money to the ground, "You can use it to pay the city for damaging public property." She said, turning around to see a large, black scorch mark in the red metal where the fire had hit it. "That the hell do you want, Tae?"

"Like I said…" He surveyed her with serene green eyes as he stepped forward, doing up one button in his long trench coat before leaning down and taking the sack of gold coins. "Money. You haven't been contributing to the coven much recently, and this hardly covers all the money that you owe. When _was_ the last time you followed the Phoenix charter?"

"Funny, I was about to ask you the same thing." She growled with a triumphant smirk, "The charter clearly states that a Phoenix can only contribute with money they get from doing a job. I haven't been doing a lot of jobs lately. This is my first one in a while actually, and I was just about to recommend my services to the demon you vanquished before sending some of this to Sarah,"

"There are many interpretations." Tae replied smoothly, running a hand through his short black hair and putting the bag of money into his palm, bouncing it slightly, "I see you haven't lost your touch, although the rules say that a Phoenix must work at least three high paying jobs a month, and this is your first in… what? Half a year or something?"

"Since when was _that_ a rule?"

"Since I made it." He replied smugly with a sickening grin, "I am the leader of the coven after all; I can do these sort of things."

"Hmm… I know." Annabelle retorted sassily, "I've been around for the last ten or so years of you doing 'those sorts of things'. I do believe that was also when our coven began being something to be feared in the magical community instead of being an organization that helped those who couldn't help themselves. But, you wouldn't know anything about that, would you?"

"Careful…" Tae growled, glaring at her warningly, "There's only so much sass I can take before…" He raised his free hand, letting a sprout of fire erupt briefly from his palm, "I lose my temper." He regained his playful composure, grinning at Annabelle again, "So, what are you going to do make up for all these back payments? And before you answer with sarcasm, remember I'm one of the few beings that can make sure you _don't_ rise from the ashes the next time you die."

Annabelle glared at him, her teeth grinding with the anger she was barely keeping held within her, "It just so happens that in all this time you think I've been wasting, I've been working the biggest job of them all. It's the job that, if we were to pull it off, would allow everyone in the coven to take a few months off."

"Oh? And just what job would that be?"

She let the smallest of smiles creep onto her lips as she spoke, "The Charmed Ones."

* * *

"What are you doing?"

Gwen froze in the middle of her action, looking up at Keith with confused shock, "I'm getting up on the breakfast bar stool. What did it look like to you?" She asked with hint of sarcasm, taking her foot off the rung of the stool and putting back onto the floor. "What's the matter?"

"You're not sitting up on a chair that high in your condition." The mutant replied flatly, "Go and sit on the couch. I'll bring you your cereal." He said, ignoring Gwen when she shook her head angrily and went to sit down on the sofa, clearly in a mood now.

"You know, now that I'm this far along, I just want the baby to come out now. I mean, Dean goes off to school while I sit in this apartment and watch General Hospital. I need something to do with my time!" She complained, glaring at Keith heatedly as he handed her a bowl of cereal. As he was the only one here, he would be the one to receive the brunt of her wrath, "You know, before I got this big, I would go for a run in the morning to shake up the cobwebs, but now I can't even do that. Pregnancy sucks."

"Well, it's not too pleasant on my end either, trust me." Keith murmured to himself as he put the cereal away, groaning with the regret of not having any cigarettes to relieve his stress. The moment the thought of a cigarette popped into his head, his eyes bugged out and he slapped himself crisply on the cheek a few times. This was his new system of stopping the urge to smoke, as he was now trying to wean himself off the nicotine gum and patches. He couldn't have picked a worse time to do it, as the lack of cigarettes was putting him on edge and combined with Gwen's mood swings, the house had become almost inhabitable for the Walker siblings.

The door suddenly swung open with considerable force, nearly flying off the hinges and smacking the wall as Pamela entered. The witch's ponytail swung violently from side to side as she strode into the apartment, stomped through the living room and vanished down the hallway, the vicious slam of her bedroom door echoing down the narrow passageway.

"Pam, it wasn't your…!" McKenzie trailed off as she entered the apartment, seeing that her friend hadn't stuck around in the living room to listen to her, "Damnit." She sighed, shaking her head sadly as Trent walked in after her.

"What's wrong with her? I thought you guys had a class." Keith asked, looking down the hallway curiously.

"We did, but…" McKenzie suddenly saw that Gwen was sitting on the sofa, engrossed in whatever was on the television and lowered her voice, "You know that witch who owns that herb store a few blocks away from the campus? You know, the one that Pam's friends with?"

"Madison… Dekker, is it?"

"Yeah… The police found her in the back of her shop this morning with her throat slashed." McKenzie said mournfully, "They had originally been called in for a disturbance because someone on the street had heard the front window smashing… along with every single other piece of glass in the place."

Keith's eyes widened and he took a weary step back, "That sounds a lot like what your-,"

"My power." She cut him off, her face like stone, "I know. I'm trying to think of any demon or creature or… anything that got away alive after I used my power on it. Maybe that'll bring us closer to finding this bastard."

"Wait, you think it was the witch hunter that done this?"

"It's the fifth witch in two months. It has to be him."

Keith groaned at this information, once again turning towards the hallway and staring it down sadly, "No wonder she took it personally…" He murmured to himself before looking back at McKenzie and Trent, "So, what's your part in all this?" He asked Trent, directing his gaze onto him.

"I'm just the chauffeur." He replied defensively, aware of Keith's hostile tone, "Mac called and said they were a little shaken after seeing Madison's body being carted into an ambulance, so I came by and picked them up. Pam was sitting on the sidewalk, rocking back and forth when I turned into the street. Mac had to practically pull her into the car. It was pretty weird to see her like that."

Keith looked at the floor, shaking his head and causing his messy hair to flop down over his eyes, "I'll go talk to her." He said softly, folding his arms and turning towards the hallway, heading towards Pamela's room.

McKenzie frowned after him as he walked away, a look of curiosity spreading across her face, "Are those two back together?"

It was Gwen who replied grumpily through a mouthful of cereal, "Who cares?"

"Pam?" Keith warily called out as he knocked on the ajar door, sticking his head in to find that the woman in question was leaning against the opposite wall, looking down at the street below through the window. Hearing no objections to his presence, he cautiously padded into the room, mindful to keep his distance, as he knew from experience that she hated to be crowded in these kinds of situations, "Mac told me what happened." The mutant informed her quietly, "You can't blame yourself for something you had no control over."

"Yes I can." Pamela replied petulantly, letting her head cock to the side and lean on the window, "… I had a premonition about an hour before Mac and I got to Madison's shop. I touched the birthstone keychain that I bought from her a while back when I was looking for my cellphone in my purse and I touched my keys by accident. I couldn't make it out exactly, it was really faint, it was more like a déjà vu than a premonition. I saw a woman, blindfolded and gagged, then… blood, everywhere."

"That's what you're basing your guilt on?" Keith asked incredulously, "Pam, by the sounds of things, you were lucky to figure out that you had to get to Madison's shop. What were you supposed to do with a premonition that weak?"

"I supposed to not have it like that at all." She responded flatly, "He's draining my powers _and_ he has more control over them than I do! My premonition started out strong, but within a second… I could feel him trying to intercept it before it just cut out. All I was seeing was flashes, not the full thing." She shook her head, heaving an angry sigh, "I can't make an object levitate without getting a migraine, I barely get a shiver when I go to breathe ice… God, I was powerless against him to begin with, but now-,"

"Hey! I don't want to hear any talk of that kind, alright?" Keith suddenly interjected, taking a bold stride forward, "If there is one thing you will never be, it's powerless. You're going to find this guy, you're going to give him the ass kicking he deserves, and then you're going to get your powers back. It's as simple as that."

"It's easy to say that when you're not going to be here." Pamela snarled bitterly, locking her glare onto him for a few seconds before storming out of her room, leaving Keith to reel from the small glimpse he had received of her true feelings.

* * *

"What about a curse?"

"It would be too risky. Curses are known for coming back and biting their caster on the ass, not to mention we don't know how long it would stick. They could be accidentally released, or they could break out."

"Maybe… we could get the elementals to seal them away again. I mean, that's how they've stayed away for the past five hundred years, right?"

"Besides that method not turning against us, it would be the same as the curse idea. Diam and Tyola broke out eventually the first time, and if we were to do it a second time, they'd probably get out even faster thanks to prior knowledge. Besides, I already asked Aidan if he knew how to do something like that and he doesn't. And since you can't summon the spirit of a deceased elemental without dire consequences…"

"Why did you look at me when you said that?"

"Simply because you've yet to suggest something." Paige responded innocently.

"Yeah, well, I'm out of ideas." Piper admitted sadly, folding her arms and leaning back in the chair she was sitting on at the dining table. "Let's face it. There's no solution to this apart from vanquishing them, plain and simple. And to be honest, I think we're wasting our time with these ideas of sealing Diam and Tyola away somewhere, because if we can't even kill the drones, what chance do we have against the queen bee?"

"Technically, the Hollow doesn't have a gender." Phoebe pointed out, trying to lighten the mood, "You're right. I know you're right." She confessed, sighing and lightly picking at the wooden surface, "But we just don't have the power to do it. We're really strong, they're really strong. It's an even match and we'd be in just as much danger of dying as they would if we took them head on."

"Plus, with their neat little power copying trick, they'd be able to replicate our arsenal within minutes in a fight, and with all our powers on top of the ones they already have, we'd probably be the ones to die." Paige pointed, taking on a similar hopeless expression to her sisters, "Maybe we should just go to Magic School right now and try to kill them. We've never really been forward planning people and we work better on adrenaline. Who knows? Maybe we'll get lucky."

"Since when did you go all kamikaze?" Piper asked with a raised eyebrow.

"Since I got _bored_ of sitting around the table strategizing." Paige snapped back, circling a knot in the table with her finger, pouting slightly. They had been doing these kinds of meetings ever since their run in with the Devil's Eye, and each time, it ended in them either having no ideas, or not taking to one another due to an argument. "Maybe there's something I missed in this archives book the Elders gave us…" She said, gripping a large golden book tightly and lifting it closer, letting it slam down onto the table with a harsh thud.

"Well, since only whitelighters can understand that angelic language, I'm gonna go and get the Book of Shadows…" Piper announced, rising from her seat at the head of the table and strode through the dining room towards the steps.

She was about to start climbing the stairs, when a small yellow flash glimmered in the corner of her eye. The witch turned around, startled when she was faced with a dwarf who had just appeared in the middle of the living room with a bag slung across his shoulder, "Delivery for-!" He was cut off when Piper, out of sheer instinct, raised her hands and blasted him into the air so that he landed neatly on the couch in the conservatory with a muffled thud.

"What the hell?" Phoebe exclaimed as she and Paige joined their eldest sister at the foot of the stairwell, eyeing the dwarf with caution while they took slow steps towards him. The trio edged to the threshold of the conservatory, before Phoebe and Paige shoved Piper in front of both of them to inspect the unconscious being, smiling bashfully when she turned around to glare at them.

"Cowards!" She hissed, before she turned back to the dwarf, who was beginning to come to.

"Lady!" He boomed, frowning darkly at Piper, "I'm a frickin' mailman!" He looked into the bag that had been thrown from his shoulder in the blast due to the strap being burnt apart. Luckily, it had landed next to him, and he was able to bring out a letter and shove it into Piper's hand. "Bite me." He said flatly, before vanishing in the same lemon yellow flash he had arrived in.

"What is it?" Paige asked excitedly, crowding Piper almost immediately with Phoebe in tow, peering over Piper's shoulder as she opened the envelope slowly despite the prodding from her sisters. She looked on the front of the envelope as she opened it, noticing a large phoenix symbol emblazoned in a deep red ink. "Maybe it has something to do with Annabelle."

"Why would it have been delivered to us if it meant for her?" Phoebe asked, before turning her attention back to the contents of the envelope as Piper finally pulled it out, "What does it say?"

"It's… an invitation."

* * *

"Oh, yeah. It's an invitation all right. I got one of these as well." Annabelle said as she inspected the piece of mail the Charmed Ones had received, looking over it with mild curiosity, "The Phoenix coven likes to keep both sides sweet by being neutral. Last year, it was a benefit for demons who had lost limbs, so it's only fair that they pander to Good this year with a benefit for the IPMO." She informed them, placing the invitation down on the dining room table and looking up at the witches' confused expressions, "Oh, that's the Institution for the Protection of Magical Orphans. It's a charity for magical children whose parents have been killed by demons or have just lost their parents due to natural causes and have no one to turn to."

"There's really a charity for something like that?" Paige asked skeptically, picking up the invitation and scanning it over.

"The situation is a lot more common than most people like to think, unfortunately." Annabelle responded sadly. "And given the nature of the charity, it's not a surprise that you guys, of all people, were invited this year."

"What _did_ we get invited to exactly?" Piper asked suspiciously, keeping her previous dealings with the Phoenixes in the front of her memory as she questioned the blonde.

"It's just a party really." She responded simply, "The magical community's most influential people gather, along with supporters of the charity. There's probably going to be a few Elders there too. You basically just have a drink and a dance, and clap when the High Priest of the coven makes his speech. Oh, and it's formal, so you get to dress up real nice." She said with a smirk.

"I could definitely use a night out…" Paige said quietly, earning the stares of her sisters, "What? It sounds like fun, and it's for a charity which hits pretty close to home, don't you think?"

After a few moments of silence, Phoebe was next to speak, "The last time I had an excuse to dress up was the opening of your restaurant, and I was pregnant back then." She admitted, looking towards Piper, "Look, after all the research we've been doing, and the hell we've been going through recently, I think we all deserve a night off for a change. And Paige is right; it's a charity that speaks volumes to us."

With both of her sisters having crumbled to this prospect of fun, Piper unclenched her jaw and sighed. What they were saying was true. After the past few months, she could use a night of dancing and fun with her husband instead of staying in with the kids once again. "It's not in same dingy cave, is it?" She asked with a hopeful glance, "Because if it us, then I'm not going, I've spent enough time underground recently." She stated flatly with a pouty expression.

Annabelle chuckled softly, "No, the address is on the invitation. Trust me; with the amount of money the coven makes, they can afford far better places than a cavern in the Underworld." She said, gripping the back of chair she was standing behind even tighter as she smiled at the three witches, "So, I take it this means you're coming?" She asked, looking around the thinking faces that surrounded her.

The Charmed Ones exchanged looks with one another, before the eldest amongst them spoke, "What the hell, we're in."

* * *

"_Tae!_" Annabelle bellowed as she strode into the grand hall of the mansion, her heels clicking against the marble floor and echoing through the massive room. It was currently being decorated for the night's festivities. The blonde recognized many of her former friends helping out, with magically conjuring a giant mural on the wall of a proud phoenix shielding a group of children from the harmful attacks of demonic beings which had been portrayed as dark, ghoulish figures, circling the mythical creature which was valiantly protecting innocents. She scoffed at the irony of the mural before turning to the other parts of the hall.

While Annabelle hated what this hall represented, she always marveled in its beauty. Three stunning bay windows covered one wall entirely, reaching up to the ceiling and rounding off in an elegant half circle. The floor, made entirely from the finest white marble, had been magically treated and gave a perfect reflection of what was on top of it. It was this effect that made it look like the entire room was glowing in the day when sun was streaming in from the windows and reflecting off the floor, dazzling everyone and everything with magnificent light. Moonlight also gave it a similar effect to a lesser extent, but this hall was even more magnificent at night. The walls were a tasteful shade of gold which accented the flawless floor perfectly, with the entire hall being brought together by a massive chandelier that hung from the ceiling, it being the most breath taking piece of the room.

It was ironic, that within all this beauty and light, she found the high priest of her coven, stomping towards him with her face like thunder, not caring who he was in a conversation with. "What the hell is this?" She spat, grabbing Tae's arm and slamming the invitation into his chest.

"An invite to tonight's festivities." He said simply, smiling to the Phoenix he was talking to before gently taking Annabelle's forearm and dragging her away from many people who were preparing the room for the evening, towards one of the large windows. "I certainly hope that you didn't ward off the Charmed Ones from coming tonight, because you know what that would mean for you." He said sweetly, making the blonde's insides churn.

"I couldn't have scared them off even if I had wanted to." Annabelle replied reluctantly, "The moment I told them that it was a party, they jumped at the chance to come." She heaved a torn sigh, her face a mask of confliction, "I don't understand why you're doing this. I'm the one who started this job, and now you're just completely taking over. Don't you trust me?"

"Of course I don't trust you." Tae answered with a sneer, "It goes against my nature, and from what my sources have been telling me, your connection to the Charmed Ones isn't just a ruse to gain their trust, you've formed a genuine connection with them." It was at this point she realized that he was dangerously close. So close, in fact, that she could see the one gold filling in his tooth at the back of his mouth as he spoke, "And speaking from experience, emotions tend to really screw up a job. That's probably why you haven't found Cameron yet…"

At this, the blonde's eyes sharpened and bore her teeth, "You mention Cameron again and I'll rip your throat out. I don't care if you are twice as strong as me. I'll kill you…" She said with a triumphant smirk, not backing down when all the colour seemed to drain from Tae's face and his expression turned into stone.

"Watch it…" He growled, before returning to carefree attitude with a disconcerting grin, "So! Do you wanna know how I'm going to kill them? C'mon, I know you're curious." He said jovially, enjoying her discomfort as he talked about murder so callously. With a smirk, the high priest looked up at the ceiling, grinning wildly, "Join me, won't you?" He asked, his eyes wild with excitement as she too looked up, "You see it?"

Frowning, Annabelle stretched upwards to see if she could see what it was. It was definitely faint, but she could see something on the ceiling, so lightly carved into the surface that no one would notice it unless they knew to look for it. It was a pentacle that nearly stretched across the full breadth of the room, covering most of the roof. There were symbols in each point, causing Annabelle to squint so she could see what they were. "Oh my God…" She breathed, finally understanding what these symbols meant and looking over to Tae in horror. "There's only one thing I can think of that needs a pentacle this big."

"Then you're probably right." Tae replied with dark eyes, turning to her, "It turns out that it's been in the ceiling all this time. It was put here by the high priest that came before me for protection in times of danger. Who'd have thought that there's been an afrit summoning circle under our noses all this time?"

"So naturally, you need to go and defile the purpose for which it was created." Annabelle spat, a hint of panic in her voice, "You… you can't. An afrit would decimate a few hundred people within seconds. You're only going after three people. Why take it to such an extreme by summoning something like this?" Her heart sank as realization spread through her body, "… You're not just going after the Charmed Ones, are you?"

"The side of Good hasn't really been paying out lately, and a lot of demons don't call on our services because of our neutrality." He explained in business-like fashion, "Killing some of Good's most powerful and influential people will definitely spread the message that we're loyal to the demons. Especially since the new Source is one of our clients for tonight's festivities, and he's gonna pay the big bucks if we kill the Charmed Ones, along with everyone else. Evil pays these days."

"Since when was this coven's morality decided by the number of zeroes on a pay cheque?" Annabelle asked, "And to do this at a benefit for the IPMO? Do have any class to craft whatsoever? If the Charmed Ones had had their powers when they were younger, they probably would have been helped by them. You're not just burning bridges with Good, you're spitting in its face!"

"Look, Annabelle, don't worry," Tae said, his expression turning serious before he burst out into another sickly grin, "Half the money we make tonight is going to charity." He stated, before chuckling a little to himself and at Annabelle's shocked disgust at the remark.

"You sick son of a bitch!" She hissed, before turning on her heel and storming out of the hall, tears streaming down her cheeks silently as she climbed up the few steps that led to the massive doors out of the room.

* * *

Annabelle slowly entered the room, turning the knob of the door gently and pushing it open carefully so she didn't make a noise. She smiled at her surroundings, which somehow felt a lot more welcoming than the hall had a few moments ago. A light curtain had been drawn over the room's one large window, allowing dampened sunlight to illuminate the room with a soothing ambient glow. It was barely furnished, with only a large oak bed against the wall opposite to the door, with a nightstand next to it.

She watched silently while a woman with short chestnut hair tended to the young man who was unconscious in the bed. With a caring touch, the woman dabbed his forehead with a wet cloth, smiling sadly before she turned to the nightstand and wrung out the cloth, heaving a large sigh as she did so.

It was lucky that Annabelle hadn't relaxed so far that she hadn't taken leave of her reflexes, as before she knew it, an athame was flying towards her face at an incredible speed. She caught it, veering her head backwards just out of instinct. "I forgot that old rule…" Annabelle said softly, making eye contact with the woman whose arm was still outstretched in its throwing position, "Kill first, ask questions later." She lowered the dagger from her eye level, inspecting it, "Nice to see you, Sarah,"

Sarah smirked in response, turning back to her charge, "I never thought I'd see you again. It's been over a decade; the rumour was that you were dead." She looked up, her pale blue eyes sparkling with a hint of excitement. "But then again, I've never been one for believing information from the grapevine, so I knew you'd pop up eventually." She stated, looking at the young man mournfully once again.

"What are you doing in here looking after Eric anyway? I thought Tae had about eight nurses looking after him." Annabelle asked, placing her hands on the end of the bed and looking over Eric's features. He had been ill all his life due to being cursed as a child for being the son of a Phoenix high priest. Before she had left this coven all those years ago, Annabelle remembered that his blackouts were becoming worse and more frequent, as he was prone to slip into comas for days on end, "How is he?"

"Alright, I guess. He hasn't had a blackout for months until a few days ago. He's going to be eighteen next month, so I hope he recovers before that." Sarah replied, putting the cloth down and trapping her hands between her knees, "And to answer your first question, I'm here because the nurses were caught stealing a few years ago, and being the coven accountant was no longer as good for the soul as it used to be, so I do this. These days, the money comes from killing a whitelighter to weaken their witch, instead of it coming from vanquishing demons…" She looked down at the floor, reflecting on her memories, before her head whipped upwards and she smiled warmly at their guest, "Besides, I'm the only Phoenix with psychic abilities, and he tends to get a little restless in his comas these days so I still feel needed somehow. It's kinda pathetic actually…"

"No." Annabelle said flatly, "You have a lot more courage for staying here than I did when I bailed out." She bit her lip nervously, not knowing how to say what she wanted, "And on the topic of bailing out…"

"Don't worry. I'm getting Eric outta here when the party starts up." She responded, a hint of venom in her tone, "Tae told me about it yesterday when he discovered the pentacle in the hall, and I don't trust him enough anymore to summon an afrit without some unintended casualties. I trust you'll be doing the same thing?"

"No, actually, I've got a few things I need to fix." Annabelle answered, shaking her head sadly, "You know, I remember when Tae was a sweet, kind, and funny guy with a dark sense of humour. It was just when he and Layana were starting out together, but now… Well, he's totally bereft of everything he once was, apart from the dark sense of humour. And Layana-,"

"Drinks far too much." Sarah interjected, nodding at Annabelle's stunned expression, "Yeah, I'll be surprised if she can even get onto her feet to hang onto Tae's arm tonight. If you ask me, they became like this when Eric was cursed. They just couldn't deal with it properly… There's no love between them now, and it's reflected in the way this coven has become."

"I couldn't agree more…" The blonde replied distantly, before shaking herself out of her trance. "Okay, I'm gonna go and prepare for tonight. Make sure you are not anywhere near the mansion, alright?" After receiving a nod of compliance from Sarah, Annabelle vanished in a swirl of particles, fleeing her former home, and everything that it now represented.

* * *

The door had closed ten minutes ago. They weren't coming back for a while.

Confident that the apartment was now empty as all the voices had died down, Pamela ventured outside her room, thankful for the solitude as she strode into the living room, only to stop in her tracks when she saw Dean sitting on the couch with Trent in the chair opposite him. She rolled her eyes, ashamed in herself for falling for such an obvious trick, "What is this?" She questioned; her voice croaky after not talking for hours, "A family intervention? It's a little thin, don't you think?"

"Pam, sit down." Trent asked her calmly, gesturing to the main sofa that was in between her two brothers.

"Oh, please. Like I'm going to-,"

"Sit!" Dean suddenly barked with anger, staring at her as if she had just broken his last nerve.

Momentarily stunned by her younger sibling's forcefulness, Pamela stood agape behind the sofa for a few seconds before responding, "Fine…" She growled, climbing over the back of the sofa and plopping down with her legs crossed like a child, "So, where did everybody is go to make this such a family affair?"

"Out." Trent said flatly, "We thought that it would be better if we were the ones who talked to you about this, seeing as how we're probably the ones that know you the best."

"If that's the criteria, then Jordann or Keith should be sitting in your place right now." She replied icily, her eyes flickering over to him for a split second before she went back to staring vacantly out of the window. "What is this about anyway? I'm not usually assaulted by a fraternal pincer attack the moment I walk out of my bedroom."

"We're worried about you." Dean responded, apparently having let go of his momentary anger, "Pam… You've just not been yourself these past few months. You've been a lot more short tempered than normal, we've barely spoken ever since I moved in properly, and even less since Gwen moved in. You've been so angry, and it's all because of this damn witch hunter."

"Look at my face." Pamela spat, pointing at the faded scar that ripped through her features like a fissure, "Wouldn't you be pissed at the guy who did something like this to you? My anger's completely justified. And by the way, forgive me for feeling like my little brother is a stranger when he produces his pregnant girlfriend out of nowhere." She said harshly, causing Dean to look down at the floor bashfully.

"Pam, just calm down…" Trent urged, 'We're just saying that… maybe it would be better if you stopped going after the witch hunter until you're in a better state of mind, that's all. Maybe if you went to go and see your therapist a bit more…"

"He has my _powers_!" She suddenly shrieked, standing up and turning on Trent, pure rage blazing in her eyes as she towered over his seated form, "What want to know what kept me alive after our parents died? It wasn't you, it wasn't Dean, it wasn't friends, it wasn't a freaking therapist, and it _certainly_ wasn't my real family! It was my powers, and now they're slipping away, and despite the fact that I now have friends and family, if I lose my powers completely then I am going to be alone! I am a _witch_! That's who I _am_! What good is a witch without powers?!" Angry tears now poured from her eyes as she stormed out of the living room, grabbing her jacket from the back of the sofa and leaving the apartment, viciously slamming the door as she left.

"Well, that went _great_…"

* * *

"… And if Lorna starts to get moody, you should draw with her, because she likes company when she does that. Oh, and around an hour before her bedtime, give her sippy cup of warm milk. That'll make your job a lot easier, trust me." Piper assured the Elvin nanny as she pointed to the particular brand of milk in the fridge. "Okay, I think that's it. Anything you want to ask?"

"No. And please, Ms. Halliwell, I've sat for your children many times. I know how to look after them." The woman assured her, smiling warmly up at the eldest Charmed One.

"Well, it never hurts to go over the basics." Piper said calmly, whipping her shawl back over her shoulders and smoothing out a crease in her simple and elegant black dress. "Have I got any hair in my face?" She asked the small woman, gently touching her hair in its swept up position with two thin strands of hair framing her face perfectly. When the nanny assured her that her hair was perfect, she smiled thankfully and walked out of the kitchen, calling back as she walked, "If there are any problems, my cell phone number is on the counter!" She walked into the foyer, smiling at Annabelle who must have appeared a few moments ago, "Wow, you look amazing."

"Thanks! So do you." Annabelle replied warmly, striking a pose in a form fitting white dress that brushed against the floor and had a plunging neckline that went down to the middle of her chest, leaving just enough to the imagination. Her long blonde hair was styled in curls that went down her back, stroking her skin as the dress had a similar depth on the back as it did on the front, "I just called Leo down while you were going through everything with the nanny. He said he'll be down in a minute. Hey, how much to do know about afrits?"

Piper blinked in surprise at the apparently random question, laughing a little, "Uh… A little. Well, enough to know that if I see one, it should only be for a few seconds before I turn round and run the hell away from it. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, um… a client wanted to summon one instead of calling on my services, and I wanted to know if they were going to be a threat to my business." She grinned widely, "What can you tell me about them?"

"Well, they're definitely not a threat to your business." Piper assured her with a firm nod, "They are extremely dangerous spiritual entities that come from the… astral plane I think. There's actually an encyclopedia on them because there are so many different kinds. Anyway, the last record of one being summoned was during the Crimson Era. A coven of witches pooled their power to summon one, but they couldn't control it, so it destroyed everything and anyone that was around when it was summoned. There's probably been more since then, but no one's lived to write about it."

"What do you need to summon one?" Annabelle probed again, noticing Piper's suspicious expression and seeing that she needed another explanation, "I'm just curious. Don't worry; I'm not planning on using one."

This answer seemed to satisfy Piper, as she went on explaining, "A helluva lot of magic for starters." She said, leaning against the pillar at the bottom of the stairs, "A summoning and binding pentacle that is appropriate for the afrit's size… Oh, and a catalyst. That's probably the most important part of all. Not for controlling it, of course, but for summoning it." Sensing that another question was coming up, Piper decided to answer it before Annabelle could speak, "The catalyst is the epicenter of the power needed to summon the afrit. If you destroy it, then the afrit is sent back to the astral plane. That's how most afrits are taken down actually. No magical being can take one on directly. Although it's a lot harder than it sounds…"

"Why?"

"Because a catalyst can be anything. An old boot, a spoon, an earring… as long as it's been charmed correctly." She heaved a great sigh, smiling wryly, "And that is why afrits are probably the most dangerous creatures ever known to magic. Anything else?"

Annabelle laughed a little, although her discomfort was clear to anyone. Piper was about to ask her why she was acting so strangely, when Leo came down the stairs, beaming as he fixed the sleeves of his suit properly, "Alright, are we ready to party?" He asked playfully with a grin, jumping down the last few steps and swinging his arm round Piper's waist, making her giggle a little, "So, we'll follow you, right?"

It was at this that Annabelle's expression cracked a little. They were completely oblivious to the fact that she was leading them to their slaughter, "Sure…" She said quietly, barely managing to plaster on a smile as she lied directly to their faces.

Hopefully, it was going to be a long night.

* * *

"Oh… wow, isn't it beautiful?" Phoebe gasped in amazement, looking around the hall as she stood at the door with her eyes wide open. She, like her sister, had also chosen to wear her hair up for tonight's party. A deep purple, almost black, dress clung to her body, being held to her form by two thin straps that went over her shoulders and into a criss-crossing pattern down her back like a corset.

"I dunno…" Brennan replied, looking around the sea of faces with a slight hint of discomfort, "This whole thing is a little too high society for my tastes, and this new shirt is chaffing like crazy!" He hissed in a hushed whisper, scratching his abdomen through the suit coat that had one button fastened.

Phoebe sighed at this as she linked her arm with his, pulling them down the entrance steps and towards the dance floor, "You can take the man outta the jeans, but you can't take the jeans outta the man, I guess." She said with an amused smile, "See? Aidan and Paige are having a lot of fun already!"

Brennan looked to where his wife was staring and could only laugh as the couple in question made their mark on the party by making sure that they got their fill of dancing. Given Paige's fashion sense and style, Brennan wasn't surprised that she stuck out a lot more than her sisters by wearing a stunning crimson red gown. The bodice of the gown fitted her body perfectly, and had a line of shimmering sparkles at the waistline and the top. It moved with her as she spun on the dance floor, easily making her the most eye catching woman on the dance floor, even more so than the tap dancing fawn. "Wow, who knew Paige was so curvy?" Brennan asked out loud, earning a smack on the arm from Phoebe before she quickly diverted him to the bar, eyeing her energetic younger sister with happy, yet jealous smile.

"I wonder why sirens are part of the band." Paige voiced her feelings out loud as she danced, glancing over to the band to see a trio of sirens in front of microphones, humming a beautiful song as the gargoyles on the instruments behind them provided the music to their singing.

Aidan looked over his shoulder at the band, smiling a little. Even at a party, it seemed that the witch in his wife never seemed to take a break, "As long as they're not seducing married men to their death, they can do what they want!" He said brightly, suddenly dipping her and making her laugh, "I thought you told me the witch in you was staying at home tonight."

"Oh, you should have known that that was a lie!" She responded with a laugh when Aidan shook his head and rolled his eyes, smiling as he suddenly spun her into a twirl before bringing her back into his body, "And here was me thinking all this time that you couldn't dance."

"Well, I got lessons before our wedding when it was still in Piper and Phoebe's control, but thankfully, that all got shot to Hell!" He said with another grin, "I guess some of it stuck!" With that, he twirled her outwards until their hands were threatening to break apart, and brought her back in, causing them both to laugh as she steadied herself once again.

"Wow! Look at that fawn go!" Piper exclaimed, watching in amazement as the fawn continued to dance by herself, her hooves clicking against the marble floor. The creature didn't have any rhythm, and she wasn't dancing in time to the song, but it was still a sight to behold, "Leo, what are those things floating around with the appetizers? They don't seem to be ghosts." She asked, pointing towards a spectral entity that was hovering through the crowd with a tray full of champagne glasses. If she focused hard enough, she could see the outline of a man within the ethereal smoke. He had a disgruntled expression on his face, but smiled nonetheless when someone stopped him to take a glass from his tray.

"It's a djinn." Leo replied, pulling his drink away from his lips. "They're summoned from the astral plane to do the bidding of whoever has summoned them, pretty powerful so they can sometimes be used in wars. They don't like it, but they're constrained by a bind that's cast the moment they appear. I guess the closest comparison is a genie, as they too are always trying to trick their master into freeing them. I guess the Phoenix coven mass summoned a bunch to work tonight."

"So they're summoned from the astral plane… kinda like an afrit?" She asked, her eyes flickering over to Annabelle who was apparently drowning her sorrows in a purple drink at the bar.

"Yeah, but I'd rather deal with a hundred djinni than one afrit." The elder replied darkly, sipping at his drink before setting it down on the tray that a passing djinn was carrying. "Wanna dance?" He asked with a grin, pointing into the dance floor, "Why don't we go over there, right where Odin is dancing with that nymph?" He suggested with a smirk. Sure enough, the normally formidable and intimidating elder was waltzing with a magical creature that was probably a tenth of his age.

"Yeah… sure." Piper said distantly, placing her hand in his and letting him drag her to the dance floor as she looked back at Annabelle with a suspicious glint in her eye.

* * *

Annabelle swirled the olive in her martini over and over again before finally taking it out and pulling it from its cocktail stick with her teeth, suddenly drinking the entire martini in one gulp and slamming the glass down on the bar, "Ah…" She sighed, before signaling to the djinn working on the bar that she wanted more of the same. "Tonight's a good night to die…" She murmured to herself.

"I'm surprised to hear that, from you all of all people."

She didn't even turn around to see who it was. She knew full well. "Why? It's not like I have much to for these days anyway." The blonde said sadly, turning around to face Tae and to find that Layana was standing next to him with a smile that was once full of warmth and kindness, but had been replaced with a smug smirk of triumphant satisfaction, "Layana, nice to… well, why don't we say I see you for now?"

"Wow, catty." Layana said sarcastically, turning to her husband so swiftly that her fiery red hair flipped over her shoulder, "Tae, maybe we shouldn't offer her a place on the podium if this is how she's going to act." She said, glancing over to the large podium at the end of the hall, as it was presumably going to be the only place protected by the afrit once it was summoned.

"I'm surprised you brought the Charmed Ones. I was expecting you to pull a trick on us at the last minute." Tae commented, separating from Layana so they could surround the woman at the bar, "I mean, that's exactly what your style is after all. I'm kinda disappointed actually."

"Don't even pretend you didn't have someone tailing me to make sure I told them nothing." Annabelle spat, accepting the martini the djinn put down in front of her and repeated what she had done with the first one, "Don't you two have some killing to do now?"

"C'mon, Tae. Let's leave her; she clearly wants to die anyway…" Layana growled, turning and walking back through the crowd with a forced sway in her hips. Her husband followed after her, looking back at Annabelle with the briefest flashes of guilt in his eyes, before he continued his way to the podium.

That was it. She had to act. Gulping down her martini for a dose of Dutch courage, Annabelle stormed away from the bar and walked straight into the dance floor, ignoring the many couples that shouted at her as she barged her way through towards Piper, who was laughing merrily at the good time she was having, and at the sight of an elder dancing with a nymph that slightly confused the blonde, before she continued towards the eldest Charmed One, "I need to talk to you." She said bluntly, causing Piper and Leo to stop dancing and stare at her with confused curiosity.

"Um… okay." Piper replied, dropping her hands from Leo's hand and shoulder, and following Annabelle as she began to walk away as quickly as she had come, heading towards the front of the band, as the mercenary hoped that the noise would cover their conversation from anyone who may be listening in. "What is it? What's the matter?"

"There's an afrit summoning pentacle in the ceiling and Tae is planning on using it to kill everyone in the room when he starts his speech." She couldn't think of a better way to put with such short notice.

"_What?_" Piper screeched, instantly looking up at the ceiling and now seeing the pentacle etched into the surface, "Oh my God, that thing is massive… And you waited till _now_ to tell me?"

"I'm sorry! I didn't have a choice, you have to believe me!" She responded in a panicked tone, looking over to the podium and seeing Tae and Layana walking up onto it with the representative of the IMPO, "Oh, crap…"

The band instantly stopped playing as Tae raised his hand, and everyone in the hall turned towards him, "Ladies and gentlemen of all species, you have my eternal thanks for your presence this evening. Some of you know may think of my coven as nothing but money grabbing horde of vicious mercenaries, but we're so much more than that." He looked around the crowd as if they were his adoring fans, smiling regally, "The meaning of being Phoenix is to help those who can't help themselves…"

"Oh, he's so full of crap…" Annabelle hissed, looking up at the ceiling and seeing that the outer circle of the pentacle was beginning to glow with a faint green light. Piper had also noticed this, judging from the fact that her face had turned the same colour of the energy, "What are we going to do?"

"Get everyone outta here." Piper responded flatly, looking as the entire area of the pentacle began to glow with the same colour. The portal was starting to open.

"We can't. If I know Tae, he's magically barricaded everyone into this room."

"Then we need to find the catalyst and destroy it." She answered, seeing that the emerald pool of energy was getting stronger and stronger as it began to swirl in the way that all portals to other realms did, "And fast!" She urged.

"… and so it is my great pleasure to hand over this donation of one hundred thousand dollars to the Institution for Protecting Magical Orphans!" Tae boomed, handing over a giant cheque to the spokesman. It was timed perfectly, as just as the crowd started a thunderous applause, a resounding crackle emanated from the pentacle, with both sounds drowning one another out and leaving the crowd oblivious to what was about to descend upon them, "It's just such a shame that the kiddies aren't going to get the chance to enjoy it…" Tae said with a sick smile, suddenly grabbing the charity spokesman by the lapels of his jacket and telekinetically throwing him into the crowd, causing a sudden burst of panic. He raised his arm towards the ceiling, making everyone to look up with his action, "Enjoy your demise!"

The moment the words left his mouth, two massive transparent green arms flew out from the portal. The gigantic hands of these limbs slammed into the sides of the hall, causing it to shake from the force and smash all three of the large bay windows with a thundering crash as they all shattered. Within an instant, pandemonium had broken out in the hall. People were screaming and running for the door, trampling anyone who was unfortunate enough to fall. Others were heading for the now shattered window panes, only to find themselves repelled by a magical force that sent them flying back into the centre of the hall. They had been trapped.

The creature's claws dug into the walls, releasing large chunks of stone and marble from the wall and allowing them to come crashing down right above the main door, crushing countless people in such a swift manner that any spectator couldn't have turned away in time even if they had been aware of what was about to happen. A giant roar from within the portal shook the hall once again as people frantically tried to find an exit. There was a few flashes of light as some tried to use their transportation powers to escape, only to find themselves repelled when they hit the same magical barrier that was keeping people from getting out the doorway and the windows.

"What the hell is going on?" Phoebe screamed as she came across her sisters and Annabelle, who had somehow found one another within the chaos. There was another rumble of the ground when a primal growl echoed from the portal, causing Brennan to put his arm around his wife and hold on to her so she didn't fall.

"We need to get everyone outta here!" Paige shouted over the din, her eyes widening when she saw another piece of rubble falling from the wall and onto another unsuspecting crowd of people. Thinking quickly, she suspended the chunk of rock in mid air with her mind, before using her telekinesis to send it flying up into the portal. There was an echoed thump, followed by a roar of pain that shook the hall even more so than the previous ones.

"Piper!" Annabelle shouted, pointing upwards with a look of terror on her face as she directed Piper's gaze to the portal, where a large snout the same colour as the arms was beginning to appear. The only parts of it that were not green were the massive white teeth that were also beginning to appear. It was wrenching itself through the gateway, as if it was too big to get through without help.

"_Alright!_" Piper suddenly bellowed, "You three!" She boomed, pointing to Leo, Brennan, and Aidan separately, "Go over to the windows and combine your powers to see if you can get through the force field! The innocents are our first priority and we need to get everyone out now!" The men didn't need to be told twice, reluctantly leaving their wives to run off towards the broken windows, "Paige, scan the astral plane with your MDS. If you find anything apart from the afrit that gives off a glow, tell me so I can blow it up! Phoebe, try and get everyone in the room to calm down. We're not going to get anyone outta here unless we manage to work together!"

"How the hell am I supposed to do that when _I_ can't even keep calm?" She screamed; her eyes wide with shock at her sister's request.

"I don't know! You're the psychic of the family. A spell, a mass psionic blast, a freaking yoga lesson! I don't care! Just do it!" Piper shouted back, causing Phoebe to run into the thick of the crowd while Paige looked around the room, her eyes glowing gold as she looked for the catalyst. "You and I are going to try and send that back with our own powers!"

"I thought you said you couldn't do that!" Annabelle shouted back, cowering slightly as the now fully exposed mouth of the afrit let out a deafening roar, giving birth to even more screams from everyone in the room and even more frenzied escape attempts.

"Well, we're going to try!" The Charmed shouted back turning towards one of the arms and rising her own, blasting it with everything she could muster and not even making the beast flinch. She was soon joined by Annabelle, who started to throw energy ball after energy ball towards the giant hand, trying to combine Piper's powers with her own for more force. Piper suddenly grabbed the blonde's hand and massed out just as a massive piece of rubble fell from the ceiling and on top of them. The rock shattered into a million stones on impact, leaving the two of them intact miraculously, as something like that would have killed them instantly.

The moment Piper took a breath, their imperviousness faded and she collapsed to her knees, her energy spent from having to protect two people from such a heavy object, "Damnit! This is useless!" Annabelle screamed, looking upwards at the afrit's emerging head with hatred burning in her eyes. But that didn't last long as her hatred turned into confusion when she noticed something.

The chandelier hadn't moved. Throughout this entire hell, it hadn't even shaken once. Even now, it was perfectly still, not one of the glass drops that hung from each light on it was moving. It seemed ludicrous, as it was on the surface where all this was happening, and yet it hadn't been disturbed in the slightest? Something wasn't right, "Piper! It's the chandelier!" Annabelle screamed as she realized, looking down at the worn out witch and pointing shakily to the ceiling fixture, "Blast it! Blast it _now_!" She shouted, whipping back round in its direction and unleashing an energy ball just as Piper raised her hands.

Their combined attack totally vaporized the chandelier, and almost instantly, the afrit and the portal burst into a shower of vivid green sparks that vanished in the atmosphere, leaving the hall to echo with the sounds of the screaming prisoners until they realized that there was no longer a danger. Smiling, some of them went towards the smashed window to walk out and end their hellish night, only to be repelled once again by the force field and land on the marble floor with a painful thud, causing mass confusion amongst them.

Annabelle strode up towards the podium, where she saw Layana lying on the ground. The special area hadn't been as protected as it was thought to have been it seemed, as there was a small boulder next to her head which seemed to fit with the bloody gash on that was barely visible within her red hair. Mercilessly, Annabelle wrenched the barely conscious woman upwards by her hair, glaring into her glazed eyes with a scowl.

"Where is he?"

* * *

The double doors to the bedroom exploded in a shower of woodchips as Piper blasted it down, allowing Annabelle to stomp in and face the creator of the whole night's events. Her face was like thunder as she walked in with eyes narrowed into slits, "_Tae!_" She shouted as the smoke began to clear. He had to be here. He wouldn't leave without making sure that his plan had succeeded. "Oh my God…"

Tae's body was splayed across the large bed, his eyes glassy as he stared out of the window with a vacant, and almost comical expression. There was a large athame buried in his gut, blood spilled out onto the pristine white sheets, making the sight even more horrifying with the desecration of something so pure. Annabelle took a few cautious steps forward, staring at the high priest's body with sheer disbelieve. "I think I know why we're all still trapped in this mansion," She said, looking up at Piper with dark eyes.

"What is it then?" The eldest Charmed One asked, also inspecting the corpse with interest and finding herself a little scared from the clear brutality of the attack.

"I didn't think that it was real… It's supposed to be a legend, but…" The blonde walked around the bed, not taking her eyes of Tae's dead body, "If the high priest of the Phoenix coven is murdered in his own home, the home instantly becomes a prison when the fatal attack is launched, making sure that the killer doesn't escape until his fellow Phoenixes have avenged his death. Then, and only then, will everyone be free."

"So, what are you saying? We can't get out of this mansion until we kind and kill the person that murdered him?" Piper asked in disbelieve, her heart sinking when Annabelle nodded slowly.

"We're trapped."

* * *

**TO BE CONTINUED…**

* * *


	35. Fight Of The Phoenix, Part II

_Please review, you guys! I put the replies to reviews on my site, the link to which you can find in my profile. Enjoy the chapter!_

**Fight Of The Phoenix: Part 2**

It was so peaceful up here.

Pamela leant against the ledge, her eyes closed as she let the wind gently wash over, caressing her skin and lightly swaying her dark hair in the night. Her face was bathed in the soft light that rose from the bustling city below and all around her, the distant sounds of sirens, car horns, and the laughter of people enjoying their night reaching her ears and making her smile. She used to be one of those people up until all those months ago, when her life had been turned upside down and everything had changed. She was so out of touch with everything around her; it was as if she was a stranger to her own life. She was nothing but a voyeur, watching herself self destruct.

"I figured you would be up here." A voice said after a familiar whooshing sound had caught her attention, making her smile slightly again. She was too tired to get angry or defensive. It was just too draining at this point. And not worth it. "I mean, hell, it's where we first met when we were trying to escape the noise."

"Then why did it take you most of the night to find me?" Pamela asked with a serene smile with no malice in her voice as she spoke. An enquiry like that was normally riddled with vicious sarcasm, but this time, it was sincere. "It doesn't matter." She added, seeing that Keith was struggling with the answer, "Are Dean and Trent pissed off with me?" She asked, avoiding his gaze and continuing to look down at the street below.

"They'll get over it." Keith responded with a hint of anger. He hadn't approved of them ganging up on Pamela when she was like this. After all this time, he had learned that the witch's first instinct when she was cornered was to fight her way out of it. "Besides, I think they're more worried about you right now. Whatever you said to them really scared them." He stepped closer to her, gently brushing her arm with the back of his hand, "What's going on inside that head of yours?"

Pamela let out a hallow chuckle as a response, "You know, for once, nothing." She said, turning to him, "I'm serious. I'm not thinking about anything, not worrying about anything… It's like I've achieved a higher state of being or something." She smiled at this, turning back to the view that lay in front of her, "But I know that the moment I step off this roof, it's all going to come crashing back… I just needed a little break, that's all." She let out a tired sigh, shaking her head, "God, I was so mean to Trent and Dean. I didn't mean to be, they were just around when it all came out."

"It's alright. They understand that you've been through Hell lately. They won't hold an outburst against you." Keith replied calmly, putting his hand on her shoulder and looking saddened slightly when she didn't seem to register his presence at all, "It was good for you just to let it all out. Do you know why? Because you can now go back to being you, and that's good thing, trust me."

"I'm not out of the woods quite yet…" She said with an amused smirk, turning properly towards him and letting his arms envelop her. "Everything is just a constant fight these days, and I'm absolutely _sick_ of fighting. I've did it all my life, and it's getting old…" She murmured wearily, enjoying the feeling of total relaxation as she crumbled to someone's comfort.

"…Come to London with me."

The moment was broken, and Pamela pulled away from Keith immediately, looking up at him with a wide eyed expression, "What… what did you just say?" She asked breathlessly, taking a few steps back and propping herself up against the ledge once more. "Because I think you just asked me to move across an entire _ocean_ with you!"

"I did." The mutant responded, hope dazzling in his eyes as he walked forward, causing her to move back until she was nearly sitting on top of the ledge, "Pam, we've wasted so much time being apart these past few months, and I don't want this to end when I get on that plane. Think about it! We could be together, you could finish your course in a fresh environment, and the only responsibilities you'd have would be to yourself. Total freedom, something I doubt even you've experienced."

Pamela stood with her mouth opening and closing several times. For someone who usually always had a reply to everything, she had been totally blindsided by this request and it had rendered her completely speechless. She thanked whatever higher power existed that the shrill ring of her cellphone provided her with an exit to responding immediately. Rather forcefully, she pushed her way out of the prison Keith had created with his arms by pressing his hands against the ledge and answered her cell, "Hello? Oh, hey, Piper. …Whoa, okay, slow down, what do you want me to do?" She rolled her eyes dramatically at Piper's request on the other end of the line, not even knowing if it was possible given her current circumstances, "…Alright, I'll see what I can do and call you back… No, you're not interrupting, it's okay." She could feel Keith's pain as she said this, turning around as she hung up and giving him an apologetic smile, "Um… can we talk about this later, please?"

"Do I have a choice?" He snapped back, not even turning around and now taking the position she had had a few minutes ago.

She decided not to answer. Instead, she pulled out a pale red vial from her jacket pocket and threw it to the floor, causing a small crimson vortex to burst into life on the ground, "Please work…" She pleaded quietly, before leaping into the portal, leaving Keith to try and lose himself in the city, and to try and clear his head.

* * *

"Door unlock, no magic block!"

Paige bit her bottom lip in frustration when the fierce orange force field flared up on the surface the French doors that led out to the balcony. The barrier glowed angrily for a few seconds, before vanishing from sight once again, having absorbed and neutralized the intended effect of the spell, "Phoebe, lemme ask you something," Paige turned on her older sister, who was currently groping every object in the room to trigger a premonition, "Has this spell _ever_ unlocked _any_ door?"

"Once." Phoebe replied mildly, placing her hand emphatically on the mantelpiece and closing her eyes. After seeing that this effort was fruitless, she went back to telling her story, "I had accidentally locked me and the kids outta the house while Brennan was at work. But yeah, you're right; it's probably the most useless spell I've ever written." She stated, clearly not seeing Paige's frustration and continuing to go around the room. "Maybe I should try the dagger. Do you know where Piper and Annabelle took Layana after they brought her up to see…?" She trailed off, glancing over at the dead body on the bed that had now had the murder weapon removed.

"No, but good luck trying to pry the athame out of that bitch's hands." The witchlighter retorted sassily, "It doesn't matter anyway. She's probably ruined all the fingerprints on the blade anyway, it's useless to us."

"Alright, that's it. No more CSI DVD boxsets for you. We don't even know if the killer used their hands." Phoebe answered, placing her hand on the bedpost and taking a deep breath, still finding nothing.

"Or if they _had_ hands…" Paige added darkly, looking towards the charred doorway left in such a state by Piper and seeing Brennan and Aidan walking into the room, sniggering about something along the way, "Hey, how'd it go downstairs? Did you find anyone that could help?" She asked, folding her arms and sitting down on the large oak trunk at the end of the bed, her crimson dress inflating slightly as she lowered herself.

"Nope, sorry." Brennan replied, giving his wife an apologetic glance, "There was an oracle downstairs, but he didn't have his crystals balls with him, so he was pretty much useless to us." He said, trying to suppress a smile while Aidan looked down at the floor, apparently also doing the same thing.

"Wait a minute, oracles only need one ball, why did you say the plural?" Paige asked, her eyes narrowing when a few chuckles escaped from both men. "Oh, I see." She said with a sigh, "Testicle jokes! What, did you guys lose about thirty years worth of maturity on the way up here?" She said scathingly, her jaw dropping in shock when the two of them let go of their restraint and burst into bouts of hysterical laughter, causing both Charmed Ones to look at one another in disbelieve.

"Gentlemen!" Phoebe suddenly boomed, "There is a dead man on the bed! A little professional decorum please?" She asked with a shrill voice and her eyebrows high, "Okay, you know what? Just go with Leo and find all the Phoenixes that are in the mansion. They're our main suspects right now."

"Easier said than done." Aidan answered, shaking his head in annoyance, "We're trying to find a group of people who make a living out of staying in the shadows. And besides, Leo's off being a company man and helping a few other Elders maintain the peace downstairs. …Hey, is it possible that only Phoenixes can get out and past the force field?" He asked, looking to the two women for confirmation.

Paige shook her head slowly, "No. If that was the case then Annabelle could have been able to get out, and that Layana woman. Hell, the whole system was probably designed to stop traitorous Phoenixes from getting away. They've gotta be in here somewhere."

"Okay, then we'll go find them…" Aidan replied tiredly, lightly hitting Brennan on the arm to spur him into action as well. "We'll see you later!" The elemental called as they walked down the hallway, vanishing from the witches' sight.

"We're going to have to fight in formal wear, are we?" Paige asked with a childish quality to her voice, looking over to Phoebe with a look of dismay as she clearly already knew the answer to her question.

"If that's the worst thing that happens tonight, then I think we should count ourselves lucky!"

* * *

Layana sat on one of the many staircases of the mansion, the weapon that had been used to kill her husband now lay in her lap, getting blood all over the dress she had worn the evening and probably permanently ruining it as a consequence. She didn't seem to care as she ghosted her fingers along the stained blade of the athame, her hands shaking as she reached the tip before her face crumpled and she reverted back into the sobbing mess she had been a few minutes ago.

It was a sight like this that sparked a small twang of sympathy within Annabelle, who had been charged with keeping an eye on the new High Priestess of the Phoenix coven while Piper went to make a phone call, although it didn't seem to be that difficult a job. It was clear that Layana wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. Even if she wanted to, she probably couldn't overpower the blonde in her drained state. "Layana…" Annabelle began softly, yet keeping an air of harshness to her tone, "Do you have any idea who could have done this? Could it have been one of the demons that were going to pay out tonight if your plan was successful?"

"No…" The redhead bleated, leaning her hand against the wall, "Tae knew that their being here would hinder things more than help. They were going to observe in the ether… Although they've probably been thrown out of the mansion's vicinity due to the barrier rising after…" She trailed off, losing the small chunk of composure she had retained while speaking and going back to choked sobs.

The clicking of heels caught Annabelle's attention and she turned round to see Piper coming back from her phone call, putting her cellphone back into her purse, "Okay, Pam's going to check the book for anything that might help, and I spoke to Phoebe and Paige upstairs. They've come up with nothing so far, but they've got Aidan and Brennan looking around for all the Phoenixes that were still in the building."

"I think that's a waste of time." The mercenary said sadly, "I seriously doubt anyone in the coven did it, we've all been raised on that legend."

"But that's all it was before tonight, right? A legend? Surely, at least one Phoenix thought it was a load of bull and killed Tae." Piper responded, inwardly cringing when Layana shot her a broken look at the mention of her husband's murder.

Annabelle shook her head, "That legend is to a Phoenix like walking under a ladder is to normal people. You don't know if it's true or not, but you abide its rules just to be safe." She glanced over to the shattered woman on the steps, a pang of pity drumming in her heart at the sight once again, "Besides, Layana's the only one that knows how many Phoenixes are here tonight, and she's not exactly in the best state to be rhyming off names."

"So… I guess that leaves us with the athame." Piper murmured delicately so Layana wouldn't hear her again as her hazel eyes zoned in on the dagger in the woman's lap.

Slowly walking over to Layana, Annabelle stood above her, bouncing her palms off each other as she tried to figure out how to ask for the dagger, "Layana… We're going to get the bottom of this, but we're going to need to see the athame first if we're going to have any hope of getting Tae's killer." The blonde would be lying if she said that she was doing this mostly because she wanted to get out of the mansion, but a small part of her still remembered better days, and wanted to avenge Tae's death.

"I already know where it's from." The redhead replied flatly, her eyes fixated on the weapon. "It's an athame made from pure adamantine, and I'm pretty sure it's from inside our vault. We performed a raid on a Grimlock den about ten years ago and found it there. It must be the one we have, adamantine takes centuries to refine for magical purposes, let alone make into a blade like this."

"Okay, if it's made from adamantine…" Annabelle began, tentatively picking the athame by the handle with her thumb and index finger, barely holding it, "You shouldn't have it on your lap, let alone in this mansion." Catching Piper's curious stare, she saw that she had to explain, "Did you know that a Phoenix's body temperature is three times that of a human's? That heat is almost as important to us as blood, and adamantine… well, it's a well kept secret of the coven that adamantine is lethal to Phoenixes. It drains us of our fire, our life. Apparently, it has something to do with the fact that the Greek god, Prometheus, was bound by adamantine chains after stealing fire from the Gods."

"I'm guessing the irony in that has been pointed out many times already." Piper droned, rolling her eyes. "Okay, well, I'll take it if it's so dangerous for you guys." She said, grasping the handle of the athame with her hand and taking it from the blonde, "Who knew that this was in your vault?"

Layana had went back to leaning against the wall as tears rolled silently down her cheeks once more, "Apart from me, only five people, and they're all dead. Tae was the last one who knew. He was against keeping it within the mansion as it's the heart of the coven, but…" Her features seemed to pull in even more as she suddenly came to a realization, "Oh, my God…"

"What?" Annabelle asked darkly, taking a step forward and glaring at Layana as she stared off into space, stunned into silence.

"It… it was Patrick that told him to keep it."

At this admittance, Annabelle's face almost matched Layana's when she had made her revelation a few moments ago. It only showed for a split second though, before her features hardened once more and stared the sitting woman down with an impenetrable glare, "He's dead. What's your point?" She asked coldly, folding her arms.

Layana bit her lip hesitantly, "I wasn't sure before… but now with the athame, it all seems to make sense." She looked up, her glassy eyes silently pleading for mercy, "When Tae and I were going up onto the podium to give the speech… It was only for a moment so I thought that it was just something stupid like my conscious bothering me, but… I thought I saw Patrick in the crowd. He vanished before I could see his face properly, but now…"

"He can't be." Annabelle replied flatly in a strained whispered, barely keeping her voice together as she spoke, "I saw that demon's claws rip through his heart, I watched him choke on his own blood as he stared at me for help and couldn't give until his eyes glazed over. He's dead. He just… He's not alive, he can't be." With a final icy stare at the redhead, she turned on her heel and began to storm off down the hallway, not even knowing where she was going.

"If you find him alive, and he's responsible for Tae's death…" Layana began with her voice now slightly stronger, making the blonde stop in her tracks from the bluntness of her comment, "You know what has to be done to free everyone. That's all I'll say." She got no reply, only the echoing click of Annabelle's heels as she walked away from the stairwell, Piper going after her with a curious expression on her face.

"Who's Patrick?" She asked when Annabelle stopped at the end of the corridor to look out of the window that took up entire end wall. The eldest Charmed One took a few steps forward so she was standing next to her, continuing to wait for an answer by looking down at the courtyard below.

"He was…" Annabelle smiled slightly as she tried to find the right words, "He was my guy. We met on the job around twenty years ago; I was in my late teens. He was trying to kill my client, and I was trying to kill his. It's a rule in the Phoenix charter that if a Phoenix finds themselves against one of their own kid, the job is to be dropped. That's why we have the tattoos, so people won't try to get out of a fight by pretending to be a Phoenix." She said, raising her left arm to show the crimson bird emblazoned on her wrist. "When that bitch Tyola sent me to the Snow Realm, she took some of my blood to try and make her own tattoo seem legit, but since it wasn't her tattoo, or her blood, I'm guessing it gave her some pain."

Piper frowned at this comment, before her face twisted into a small smile, "Oh, yeah…"

"_Oh no you don't!" Phoebe suddenly warned, striding towards Piper and spinning her right leg, raising her left into a roundhouse kick that was caught by her older sister thanks to her enhanced reflexes. Piper threw her leg back down to the ground, raising her fist towards Phoebe's face, only to have the middle Charmed One grab her wrist and twist it violently, using the window of momentary pain to land a kick into her stomach._

"_I am really getting sick of those kicks…" She growled, hurling her hands towards the ground and encasing Phoebe's feet in a thick layer of cobwebs that flew from her wrists, ensnaring the witch and rendering her unable to move. "Let's see you get me now…" Piper grinned, before a psionic blast collided with her head, causing her to stumble back in surprise from the low power mental attack._

"_That was just a warning." Phoebe snapped, "Paige! Trap them both and we'll figure this out."_

_But before the witchlighter could make a move, she was hit by an explosive blast that had flown from Piper's hands. She felt the geokinetic gravitational force from her older sister's power pin her to the attic's slanted ceiling, before both Piper and Sharon threw out their hands and covered her hands and feet in thick webs, sticking her to the ceiling. "For God's sake, Piper!" Paige exclaimed, wriggling fruitlessly as she tried to dislodge herself._

_Annabelle spun around, facing the two women who were still free. She held out her hand, conjuring a sizzling bright blue energy ball into her palm, "Alright… You've spun your last web, bi-," Her words were suddenly cut off by gasp of pain, "No!" She growled, ripping off her glove to reveal that her phoenix tattoo was burning with a searing hot light that seemed to be spreading pain through her entire body. "Not now… Please, not now…" She whispered as she fell to her knees, clutching her head and curling up into a ball before collapsing to the floor unconscious._

"Serves her right." Annabelle spat, glaring out of the window before going back to her story, "Anyway, we just… kinda hit it off after that. We never got married of anything, didn't really believe in it, and we felt we didn't need some piece of paper to tell us that we were meant to be." She turned to Piper, her eyes showing a vulnerability that had never been there before. She broke out into a strained smile, "We had a son, Cameron." She said, turning away from the witch once again, "He was only seven when he was taken."

"Taken?"

"Right out of his bed in the middle of the night." Annabelle confirmed, "Patrick and I heard him screaming, so we rushed to his room to find him struggling to get out of a demon's grip. Pat was never one to think something through, and in this kind of situation, all rational thought went out the window… He ran straight into the demon's claws. So, basically, the last image Cameron got of his parents was his father dying while his mother stood, frozen in fear like an idiot."

Piper looked visibly crushed by this news, looking down to the floor in a melancholy fashion as she shook her head slowly, "I'm so sorry, I had no idea… And being around Wyatt and Chris at the age they are-,"

"It's been Hell." She replied flatly, "But it's not exactly your fault for having kids and being happy. In fact, it's helped spur me on in times where I thought there was no hope in finding Cameron." Annabelle instantly recognized the look on Piper's face as she spoke, as she had seen it on the two other people that she had told of her quest, "Don't look at me like I'm holding on to false hope. That and anger have been the only two things that have kept me going all these years. I have to believe that if they had wanted him dead, they would have just killed him, and not taken him. Emma was actually helping me find him before she shirked every responsibility in life and killed herself." She said bitterly, earning a slight of nod of agreement from Piper, but she didn't see it.

"Well, it's about time I found you!" Sarah exclaimed as she rushed towards the two, causing Annabelle's eyes to bulge with surprise at the sight of her old friend as she approached them.

"Sarah, what the hell are you doing here? I told you to get out of the mansion before the party!" Annabelle said, causing a look of shock to spread over Piper's face as she spoke.

"Tae wouldn't let me leave. Clearly, he trusted me enough to look after his son while _in_ the mansion; he just didn't trust me enough to bring him back if I left." She said sourly, her eyes blazing with hate for the deceased leader, "I'm so glad that you're alright. I saw all the damage in the hall and thought the worst, especially with all that blood underneath some of the rubble." She added solemnly, "Any idea who killed Tae yet?"

"… We're working on it." Annabelle replied quietly, avoiding eye contact, "Listen, Sarah, we've got a few things we need to take care of. Can you just keep an eye on Layana while we go and try to figure this out?"

"Sure, I got one of the Elders from the party to look after Eric while I came to find you. I'm sure she won't mind sticking around. Good luck!" The brunette added as she walked off down the corridor to where Layana had been sitting.

"Okay, so let's-," Annabelle cut herself off when she saw Piper's thunderous expression staring back at her, "What's wrong?"

"You told your friend to get out of the house, so you knew that an afrit was going to be summoned _before_ the party, and not during." Annabelle's heart sank at the witch's words, knowing what was coming next, "You led all those people to their deaths. You tried to lead me and my family to our deaths. You could have told an Elder, you could have told me. Actually, anything you could have done would have better than what you _did_ do." Piper seethed, glaring at the blonde with jaw clenched tightly.

"Piper, I had no choice." She pleaded, "Tae had people watching me. If I had tried to tell anyone about what was going to happen beforehand, they would have killed me. And if that had happened, no one would have known about the afrit at all. Just before it was summoned was the only time it was safe. You have to believe me!"

Piper bit her lip and let out a sigh, surveying Annabelle with suspicious stare, "I don't." She replied stonily, before her features softened a little, "But we don't really have a choice right now, so I'm just gonna brush this under the carpet for now until we have a bit more time to deal with it."

"Okay… thank you." Annabelle replied, starting to bow but then deciding against it, "We should go and find your sisters. We've left them alone in this house for too long." She said, beginning to walk towards the main staircase of the mansion with Piper following her.

"What's that supposed to mean?" She responded defensively as they climbed the steps.

"Are you kidding?" Annabelle snorted, stopping and turning around on the stairs to face the witch, "Piper, your family is comprised of rare magical creatures. All three Charmed Ones, an elemental, an Elder, and a genetically modified witch. All of the above are highly sought after in the magical world, and some Phoenixes will want to use this chaos to their advantage and collect a bounty or two."

"But wait, Brennan and Aidan are wondering around this place on their own, are they in any danger?"

Annabelle let out a small chuckle as she resumed climbing the stairs, "Aidan's a king. Just because you can't see the entourage that travels with him, doesn't mean it isn't there. Trust me; he's probably the safest out of all of you right now."

"Kinda inappropriate to invoke trust right now, don't you think?" Piper scoffed, receiving no answer as they continued to climb the steps.

"I'm sorry…"

* * *

Aidan scoffed at what was before him, smiling triumphantly as he put his hands on his hips, "Why don't they just paint the words 'BIG SECRETS IN HERE'? It would probably be a lot more subtle than this." He smirked at Brennan, who had already walked forward to inspect what they had found. "Do you think you can get in?"

They were standing in front of a set of giant iron doors, with only the dim light of the torches at either side illuminating them. Carved into the surface across both doors was the silhouette of a phoenix with its wings proudly outstretched to the point where they covered the entire span of the doors, "Well, something like this is probably magic proof. Phoebe has a spell that opens magically sealed doors, but its crap and hardly ever works, even with the Power of Three."

"So that's a no?"

"No. That was a no." Brennan replied, grinning at Aidan before turning to the doors, "What was that spell…? Oh, yeah. Time shall ravish what used to stand, make these doors crumble, as if they were sand." A spiritual wind blew through the basement as Brennan took a few steps to admire his handiwork. An angry blue force field erected over the doors, but slowly, it began to fade away, "Over time, even magic can wither." The mutant said sagely as the spell decayed the magic, before turning on the doors themselves. Patches of dirty orange rust began to spread across the two iron slates, before they crumbled into dust without warning and clearing their path.

"Nice." Aidan commented approvingly, "If you invoke time, you can pretty much do anything."

"Exactly." Brennan replied as they walked into the room, finding its contents even more extravagant than its entrance.

It was like a pirate ship, with all kinds of treasure splayed across the giant room as if they where exhibit pieces in a museum. Large suits of armour, encrusted with diamonds and other precious jewels were suspended in the air within columns of faint light. Small marble tablets floated in front gave details of every piece in the vault. Massive swords, ancient maps, and even balls of pure magic were contained here. It was as if the Phoenixes had their own private collection of magical history.

Brennan approached one particular suit of armour, eyeing it curiously. It was an intoxicating deep red, and glowed within its confines of light. Large, dangerous looking spikes protruded from the shoulders, while the main chest looked as if it had been built up from the base, with each tier getting thicker and thicker. "'Forged and worn by the first Source in the final battle of the Crimson Era.'." Brennan read aloud from the tablet before him, "'Impervious to all kinds of magic and metal. Testing not yet completed. Helm is still unaccounted for.' Wow, this is pretty powerful stuff." He remarked, turning around to see where Aidan had gone, only to find him staring at something on the other side of the room.

"Where do you think this is?" Aidan said sourly as Brennan walked over to him. The column of light that they were standing before was empty, leaving only the marble tablet of what it was, "'Pure adamantine dagger. Forged shortly before the Fall of Ivalice by Ivalician mages, lethal to those of the Phoenix coven.'… Wasn't Tae stabbed?"

"Yeah…" Brennan said darkly, catching on to the elemental's train of thought, "And since Phoenixes can normally regenerate after a stabbing, he must have been stabbed with that otherwise he would have just popped back up a few minutes after. Why would they keep something that's lethal to their own kid?" He mused out loud, before a small echoing knock on the marble floor caught both of their attentions, "Did you hear that?"

Aidan nodded slowly, turning around to where he thought the noise had come from, "Show yourself!" He shouted threateningly, raising his hand and causing a bright blue sphere of powerful energy to erupt in his palm. This caused Brennan ready his own power, a net of electricity igniting over his hand, originating from his fingertips.

An energy ball suddenly flew out of the darkness and towards the two of them. Thinking fast, Aidan threw forward his own projectile, causing the two energies to cancel one another out, sending out a small shockwave and making all the artifacts shake in their magical containment fields. Brennan then threw out sparking tesla coil that cut through the darkness, colliding with something unseen to both men before a thud echoed through the vault.

Brennan and Aidan exchanged hesitant looks before they walked over to where they had been shot at. Brennan ignited another tesla coil within his palm to act as a source of light, revealing an unconscious man around their age, smoke rising from his right flank where the electricity apparently hit him. "You… don't think I hit him too hard, do you?" Brennan asked quietly as they circled the downed person.

"Let's just take him back upstairs." Aidan said, bending down, taking one of the man's arms and putting it around his shoulders, "He was skulking around in a dark vault full of priceless artifacts, and he attacked us first. I think we've got a suspect."

* * *

"Why don't you hurry up and do something?"

"We want outta here!"

"You want us to pay you? We'll pay you!"

"Damn Phoenixes!"

Leo let out a tired sigh as he rubbed the bridge of his nose. It was situations like this that made the thought of giving up his powers even more seductive to him. He had known a lot of tonight's guests for most of his magical life, but while he knew that they were terrible in high pressure situations, he never expected this kind of chaos. Neither had Odin apparently, who also seemed to be nearing his wit's end.

"This is the last time I leave the heavens." He spat bitterly, "I've never seen so many good people go near demonic over a bit of confinement. What is wrong with these people?"

"You forget." Leo began, shaking his head with a rueful smile, "All demons are brought up with warrior ways. It doesn't matter what specie of evil they are, that's how they live. Our side on the other hand… well, it's really only witches that have to fight. Most of the people here tonight have never had a day of conflict or tension in their lives. They don't know how to deal with this."

"And neither do we." The Elder responded, gritting his teeth, "Do you know if the Charmed Ones are remotely close to figuring all this out?"

"No, because I've been stuck here, doing the Elder thing." Leo snapped back with his eyes narrowed, "You know, to not act directly, just to hang back in the sidelines and be near useless while beings less powerful than us put their lives on the line."

"And what is _that_ supposed to mean?"

"Never mind…"

* * *

Pamela flipped through more pages in the Book of Shadows, don't even knowing what she looking for. Most of the spells in the book that worked on force fields could only be used from the outside of the barrier, and she didn't have enough power by herself to break through centuries old magic. "There's nothing in here that can help you." She said into the phone that was pressed against her ear, "The only thing remotely relevant to this situation is a Power of Three vanquishing spell for the Phoenix High Priest, but someone already beat you to it there, so…"

Piper let out a frustrated sigh at these words as she descended the main staircase with her sisters and Annabelle, "Okay, try branching out from that. Is there anything that would else find a killer?"

"Well, I saw a truth spell a few pages back-,"

"No." Piper responded urgently, before resuming her serenity, "Anything else?"

"Nope… Hey, what about using Phoebe's powers?" She asked, stopping her search through the tome as she felt she was onto something, "Yeah! Surely, she can sense a killer after all this time."

"That might actually work as long as she control her powers well enough, which, after fourteen years, I would be severely shocked if she couldn't." Piper said, her spirits uplifted slightly at the thought of progress. "Hey, what did you tell Mrs. Hunter? I'm assuming you had no problem with the Elvin nanny or Skye." She asked, knowing that Skye had been looking after the twins that night and that Brennan and Phoebe had the only magic ignorant babysitter.

"Oh…" Pamela hesitated, "I just spun the old family emergency excuse. She was glad to help out." She said, remembering that she was the only one who knew her aunt's next door neighbour was really Connor and Faith's whitelighter.

"Okay, call me back if you find anything." The eldest Charmed One replied, hanging up and putting her cellphone back into her purse as they neared the main foyer. Piper looked up at the sound of her sisters' gasping with surprise as they neared the entrance to the mansion. She smiled at what she saw before her.

The chaotic rabble that she had seen around an hour ago had been rendered silent by the band from the party setting up a concert in the foyer in an attempt to keep the peace. People were swaying rhythmically to the melodic hum of the sirens while the gargoyles continued this somber mood with the light strums of cello strings and the low, gentle tinkering noise as the drummer carefully tapped the symbol. Those who had lost comrades to the afrit had even forgotten their anger, now choosing to silently muse over the night's happenings from their vantage point on the floor.

"Wow, I didn't expect this…" Phoebe said softly, not wanting to break the calm by speaking too loud. "Although given your reputation for finding peace in conflict, Leo, I can't say I'm that surprised." She said with a warm smile to her brother in law, who smiled proudly at his achievement.

"Yeah, I figured since the band wasn't going anywhere anytime soon…" Leo trailed off, allowing them to see the rest of his story act itself out before them, "How did you guys get on?" He asked; looking at his two sisters in law as his wife conversed with Odin on a higher step on the main stairway.

"Not good." Paige said grumpily, putting one hand on her hip and making Leo notice she was holding her shoes by spinning the straps around her fingers, "Yeah, they were killing me." She said flatly when she caught his gaze, "Anyway, we've still made no progress. Phoebe even got her hands on the dagger that killed Tae, and she got nothing from it." She said, nodding in her sister's direction, who looked slightly offended at this news. "Oh, come on, Pheebs. You can't blame yourself. I know you've been getting a bit more control over your visions, but you can't expect to score every time."

"I know…" Phoebe replied meekly, before pulling her mood back up, "Do you know where Brennan and Aidan are? They went to go look for Phoenixes and we haven't seen them in a while."

"Um… Yeah, they came down here before going down into the basement." Leo answered, sneering a little as he spoke, "But I doubt they'll find anything. It's a bit of an obvious place to hide, don't you think?"

As he spoke, the large door to the side of the main stairway opened to reveal the two men in question carrying another man between them. Thankfully, due to the band playing, only a few people turned around to see what the noise was, and when they did, they didn't give it much thought. After everything that had happened tonight, the identity of an unconscious man and how he had come to be that way wasn't a large interest anymore. "A little help please?" Aidan called out to the party on the steps, causing Leo to walk down towards them to assist.

"Bring him up to the landing." Odin ordered calmly, turning on his heel to walk up the steps. "Where did you find him?"

"In some museum type place in the basement." Brennan replied, looking over to see that the man's shaggy hair was covering his face in his limp position. Due to the darkness downstairs, they still hadn't got a proper look at the man's face. "There were all these magical artifacts on display, but there seemed to be one missing. An adamantine dagger that's apparently lethal to the Phoenix coven."

"Oh, yeah. We've already found that." Annabelle said as the group climbed the final steps, "So, that confirms what Layana says. The dagger that killed Tae was taken from the vault after all…" She looked down on the floor as the guys put their newly acquired suspect on the floor, letting his hair flop off his face and reveal his features, causing all the colour in Annabelle's face to drain suddenly, "Oh my God…" She knelt down next to the man, her eyes wide as they darted all over his body, noting the Phoenix tattoo on his exposed wrist.

"Is this…?" Piper began, only to be cut off when it seemed the blonde's actions were answering her question for her.

Her erratic behaviour came to a halt when the man let out a low groan as he came to, revealing a pair of steely grey eyes that were probably even fiercer looking when he wasn't fighting off unconsciousness, "Anna-?" He was cut off when Annabelle's fist suddenly connected with is face, knocking him out once again as his head hit the marble floor with a vicious thud. The group watched on in shock, Piper covering her mouth and nose with her cupped hands.

"You bastard…"

* * *

"Wow…" Phoebe breathed as Piper finished telling the group what Annabelle had told her about her partner and son. She leaned against the doorframe of the bedroom where Patrick had been taken to rest after being punched, Annabelle staying vigilantly at his side, now conversing with him since he had woken up. "Do you believe her?" She asked bluntly, earning a look of mild surprise from Paige, "What? Even I withhold trust a few times, especially after finding out that she knew about the afrit beforehand."

"She had her reasons." Leo said defensively, having known Annabelle for longer than all of them, "They would have killed her if she had tried to tell us, and then no one would have been able to stop the afrit. Trust _me_…" He said, glancing at Phoebe, "She was my charge for a long time before she vanished, and she never liked what the coven was turning into. She wouldn't do something like this unless there wasn't another option."

"You're the psychic." Paige said pointedly, trying to hide the fact that she too wanted some answers, "Why don't you see if there's any evil in there?"

At her sister's prompt, Phoebe turned around into the room, staring intensely at the Annabelle's back as she probed inside her heart and mind, careful to tread lightly as the blonde had probably had training to sense when someone was being psychically intrusive. The middle Charmed One bit her lip as she spun around, her look pensive. "I think she's probably telling the truth. I can't be sure, but her thoughts and emotions are so over the place I can't make one thing out from the other. That kind of mental chaos is not something you can fake, and since it usually happens after a particularly traumatizing event…"

"Like finding out the man you've grieved for over the last decade is alive?" Paige asked sharply, "But that's the thing. She was so sure that he was dead, that she watched him bleed to death while a demon took her son away, so how is all this even possible if she _isn't_ lying?"

"Good question…" Piper said reluctantly, folding her arms with a sigh. "Maybe we should talk about this somewhere else. You know, where she isn't in earshot?" She suggested quietly, beginning to walk away with everyone else following her apart from Phoebe, who turned back into the room, her eyes narrowed in thought.

"You got something on your mind?" Brennan asked her softly, putting his hand on the back of her neck and rubbing it gently. This night had been tough for all of them. Aidan had already taken Paige back into the main hall where the afrit had been summoned, as it was the only room that was remotely close to being outside, and after all this time being cooped up with no way out, the claustrophobic witch had slowly been cracking up over the past few hours.

"Yeah…" Phoebe replied distantly, turning to Brennan with glassy, "Don't go and die on me, okay? I don't… I couldn't live the way Annabelle has for the last ten years. It would finish me, I just couldn't."

Brennan smiled at her, planting a kiss on her forehead, "I'm not going anywhere, alright?" He said reassuringly, "You coming?" He asked, beginning to walk in the direction the rest of the group had disappeared in.

"In a minute. I'll catch up." She said, giving him a beaming smile before he walked off, allowing her to enter the bedroom, inhaling deeply as she took a step inside.

Something about Annabelle had bothered her from the start. But it was different for her. It wasn't the way she acted, it wasn't the way she kept to herself, and it wasn't even the fact that she was an extremely dangerous entity. For Phoebe, it had been something she had sensed from the first second of meeting Annabelle on their attic floor a year and a half ago. Her mind wasn't right. It was subtle, and would be impossible for a non-psionic to pick up on, but it was there. Someone had messed with her mind a long time ago, and it was so powerful and masterful, Annabelle herself hadn't even realized it. It vanished for a year, when Annabelle was unwittingly replaced by an imposter, and Phoebe just forgot about it, until she sensed a similar glitch within Patrick's mind.

"Are you in there?" Annabelle asked airily, raising an eyebrow and exchanging a look with Patrick as Phoebe continued to stare into his eyes, as she had for the past few minutes.

"Do I have something on my face?" He asked, looking back at the middle Charmed One with an apprehensive glance, now a little perturbed at her behaviour.

"No…" Phoebe replied, looking up and pursing her lips, "Okay, listen, this is going to sound really weird, but just bare with me. Ever since I met you, I've always sensed something odd in your mind, and now, I'm sensing the same thing in Patrick." She said, looking over to him, "Can you guys tell me what you both remember from the time Cameron was taken?" They both visibly flinched at his this request, causing Phoebe to recoil, "I'm sorry, but something isn't right, and this might even help you get to the truth."

"You already know what I remember." Annabelle said sharply, turning to Patrick with a sorrowful look, "Patrick dying, Cameron getting taken…" She frowned, looking down at the duvet with a dark stare, "But… the rest is kind of a blur. That's strange." She commented, finding it odd that she hadn't noticed this before, "What about you?"

"Pretty much what you remember. Except, in my version… you were the one who died, and I was the one who stood there like a total moron. When I saw you sitting over me, I thought I had died… until you punched me." He said with a twinkle in his eye, smirking at Annabelle, "The only reason I was even here tonight was so I could work damage control when the afrit came." He said, taking on a similar look to Annabelle's, "What the hell is going on here?"

"Hopefully, it'll all become clear soon." Phoebe responded cryptically, looking between both of them, "Would you guys allow me to try and go in there to fix whatever's been done to you? From what I can tell, it's some kind of memory block, so once I get rid of it, you should start remembering stuff. It may not work immediately though, as some memories had been pushed down into your subconscious. It shouldn't take long to get rid of it, seeing as how whatever it is was put in place years ago and will probably crumble under my powers, so basically-,"

"Do it." Annabelle said flatly, grabbing Patrick's hand. "We need to find out the truth."

"Okay…" Phoebe said solemnly, closing her eyes as her forehead began to glow with gentle white energy. Thin tendrils of light flew from her forehead and towards and Annabelle's and Patrick's, massaging their minds softly and slowly breaking down the block that had been put there all those years ago. They took in a gasp of breath as the light connected with them, before visions of the past began to assault their minds…

_Annabelle tore her scythe through another Raptor demon, slicing him in half with an upward slash before spinning around and cutting right through another Raptor at a downward angle. Flames burst to life at her sides as the demons were consumed by the cleansing fires before vanishing completely into wisps of smoke. "That's twenty four…" She murmured to herself, looking down one of the many halls of the Phoenix mansion. Scorch marks littered the floor, the ceiling, and the walls. Paintings had been incinerated, furniture had been destroyed. They hadn't expecting this ambush from the Raptor demons. If they had, the evil beings wouldn't have even got this far._

"_Anna, watch out!" Patrick bellowed as he ran down the hallway towards her, launching an energy ball in her direction that zipped right past her and connected with a Raptor demon, just before it planted its claws into her back. It was quickly dispatched in a plume of fierce flames, allowing the two of them to return to their conversation._

"_Did you get Cameron out alright?" She asked desperately, grabbing his arms tightly._

"_Yeah, don't worry, he's fine." He said calmly, feeling her grip loosen slightly, "Sarah got him outta here just before those bastards raised the force field. I couldn't find Eric though. Tae and Layana must be keeping him with them."_

_She rolled her eyes at this news, cursing under her breath, "What are they thinking? I know they're more powerful than the rest of us, but choosing to keep Eric here rather than getting him to safety? Ugh, we need to find them. Come on." She urged, grabbing his hand and beginning to run down the hallway before the deafening screech of a woman cause them to halt in terror. Annabelle recognized that scream. She should, having known the person nearly all her life, "Layana!" She breathed, resuming her pace and running even faster now._

_Once they turned the corner, the couple stopped once again at the sight before them. Tae had his back to them, his arm raised as he vanquished what looked to be the leader of the Raptor demons, given the enormity of the claws that were sticking out his hand. The demon promptly burst into flames, his claws remaining undamaged as they fell to the floor with an echoing clatter._

_There was a chilling silence after that moment, only broken up by Layana's sobs as she held on tightly to bloody corpse of her child. It seemed the demon had run his claws right through him…_

Annabelle winced with pain as Phoebe withdrew her power from both of their minds. Both Phoenixes held their foreheads as massive headaches now plagued them from having to vividly relive such a brutal memory that was thought to be forgotten. Phoebe, it seemed, had also seen this due to her connection at the time, and held onto the bedpost to balance herself, her face now completely white. "What… what was that?" She asked; her voice reduced to a strained whisper.

Annabelle, caught up in the revelation this had brought, didn't even register Phoebe's question as she turned to Patrick, who was now getting up off the bed. "Why would we be made to forget about Eric being killed? I don't even remember a raid the Raptor demons were in charge of!"

"The more important question is who the hell has Sarah been looking after all these years?" He asked urgently, standing next to her, their eyes wide with shock and adrenaline. "Phoebe, who could have done this to us? Who has the power to make us forget something so significant?"

"For you guys to not even get the slightest hint of regaining your memory…" Phoebe began, recovering from the memory she had experienced, "It would have taken a really powerful psychic. The memory block was buried deep, which was why it was never effected or weakened by the normal motions of your mind." She replied.

"Hey!" Piper beamed brightly as she entered, "Phoebe, Pam just called me. She read in the book that a Phoenix called Sarah has been the coven's only and most powerful psychic for the last three hundred years. If you want to start interrogating the guests, we might want to enlist her help. That's the woman we left Layana with, right?" She asked, turning to Annabelle before assessing the mood of the room. "Was it something I said?"

* * *

Sarah wrenched open another drawer, dragging her large bag along the floor with her foot as she moved along the dresser, shoving all her belongings into the bag as she went. She glanced over to the bed, seeing that he was slowly beginning to wake up from his recent coma. The Phoenix bit her lip in confliction between packing and tending to her charge of last decade, before realizing that there was one clear choice, "I'm sorry I have to leave you like this…" She said sadly as she stood over him, a harsh blue psionic blast hovering above her eyes.

"You're not going anywhere."

Sarah spun on her heel to find Annabelle and Patrick staring her down from the doorway. She started at them like a deer caught in the headlights, her psionic blast still hovering above her head. "I should've known…" She began sadly, "That the moment you began to hang out the Charmed Ones, all of this would start to unravel." The sphere of mental energy burst into a final blaze of glory before vanishing completely.

"I remember what happened now…" Annabelle said, her voice nothing but a murmur, as if she had talked normally; she knew that she wouldn't be able to hold back the tears anymore. "Eric didn't get cursed and end up going in and out of comas all his life… He died eleven years ago in a raid on the mansion. Tae and Layana completely fell apart… they were no longer strong leaders; their powers disappeared when Eric did. So they tried to fill the void…" She had to stop as tears began to roll down her cheeks. Sarah had been the only one in the entire coven that she had trusted all her life, and now, even she had betrayed her. "They tried to fill the void by taking Cameron and making him their own."

"We fought like hell to keep him, but you made us forget all that." Patrick snarled, storming forward in such a manner that made Sarah take a few steps back in fear, "Why?" He asked her, his eyes wide. He got no response as Sarah was paralyzed with shock and guilt. The Phoenix suddenly gripped her by the arms and shook her violently, "_Why?_"

"To save you!" Sarah screamed, now on the verge of crying herself, "After Eric died… Tae and Layana changed. They were willing to kill the both of you to get Cameron, and even in their grief weakened states, they would have slaughtered you. I provided a way that would allow you to keep your lives! So… I took parts of what happened on the night of Eric's death and made into something that would split you apart so you wouldn't be a threat to them… I'm _so_ sorry!" She was now completely sobbing, her composure shattered by decade old secrets finally coming to the surface.

"So, the boy lying in that bed is…?" Annabelle asked hopefully, glowering at Sarah, who could only nod silently in reply.

"They made me put him into a deep sleep whenever either of you visited the mansion. I knew that, seeing as how deep I had put the memory block, talking to Cameron would be the only thing that would break it without another psychic intervening…" Sarah explained quietly as Patrick let go of her to check on his son.

"Why did you kill Tae?" Annabelle continued darkly, "Did having to live a lie for all these years finally get to you?"

Sarah rolled her eyes tiredly, "I didn't kill Tae…"

"Oh, and we're supposed to believe you after all _this_?"

"It was Layana!" She suddenly bellowed, "She told me when you left me alone with her, but I wasn't exactly going to do anything to piss off the woman with the adamantine dagger… That's why I was packing. I'm leaving; I want absolutely _nothing_ to do with this coven anymore. It's poison." She said angrily, going back to packing while Annabelle tried to process this information.

"Why…? Why would she kill Tae?" Annabelle breathed; her eyes wide with terror and shock. She wasn't sure how many more revelations she could take this evening.

"I don't know. You'll have to ask… Annabelle!" Sarah suddenly shouted as the blonde stormed out of the bedroom.

"Anna!" Patrick shouted after her, "Come back!" He bellowed, looking around when Cameron let out a small groan as the psychic slumber started to ware off. It had been a decade since he had last seen his son, a decade since he had seen what his eyes looked like; they were probably the only thing that hadn't changed. Sure enough, it was as if he was seeing his own eyes in the mirror when Cameron opened his to reveal silvery grey orbs staring back at him.

"I began the reversal process to his memory blocks before I started packing…" Sarah said softly, "He was eight when he was taken, so he'll still remember you."

Patrick swallowed back his happiness of the moment, turning his head towards Sarah with a suspicious glare. "I need you to look after him under I come back. When I do come back, I don't care what you do or where you go, just stay away from me and family after this…" He growled, standing up to his full height and striding proudly across the bedroom, giving chase to his partner.

* * *

Annabelle ran into the vault as fast as her heels would allow her, her white dress nearly glowing in the dim light of the chamber. "Layana!" She bellowed, her voice echoing through the endless expanse of darkness. Even she didn't know how far this vault went. For she knew, Layana couldn't even hear her because she was so far away. She had to be in here. It was the only place she could hide from the many servants, Phoenixes, and party guests that were now combing the mansion in an attempt to try and find her after the news of her deeds had reached their ears.

"So, you figured it all out…" A voice said from within the shadows, now completely free of the apparent grief ridden shakiness that had plagued the woman's voice. Annabelle had to hand it to her, she was an excellent actress. "I guess you've come to kill me, but you've got yourself two dilemmas there…"

"Give it up, Layana. It's over." Annabelle called out confidently, scanning the immediate area around her and looking for any sign of life.

Layana seemed to ignore her, "For one, you probably don't even have the power to defeat me, since as the new High Priestess of this coven, I absorbed Tae's powers when he died. Add that to my own powers, and I'd obliterate you. Secondly…" She came out of nowhere, walking casually out of the darkness in front of Annabelle, "Killing me may get rid of the force field Tae's death created, but since I'm the new leader, the moment you kill me, a new force field will rise. It'll be like it never went away in the first place."

"Why did you do it…?" The blonde murmured intensely, glaring at the redhead with contempt.

"Behind every man is an even greater woman…" Layana mused to herself, cocking her head slightly, "Tae's been my puppet for so long, and a good one at that until recently. He was acting by himself, going after the Charmed Ones for example. I had a feeling we wouldn't be able to pull it off, but he was confident that you wouldn't betray us… then you did." She finished menacingly, "I slipped the dagger into my dress before the party, and when Tae got me out of the hall, I killed him and returned to hall where acted my ass off."

"So, I guess you're one of the people who thought that the whole force field thing was a load of crap if you decided to kill him behind his back." Annabelle smirked, pleased that his miscalculation had allowed them to figure all this out.

"On the contrary, I knew exactly what would happen. You see; this dagger…" She brought her hand out from behind her back, revealing the adamantine dagger in her fist, "… not only kills Phoenixes, but it kills their magic as well. I can stab the force field with this, and we're all free. I just had to play the aggrieved widow for a while before using it." She said, smirking as she ran a finger along the blade. Her glee turned to confusion when Annabelle began to laugh, "What's so funny?" She asked, glaring.

"Oh, nothing." Annabelle replied brightly, "I'm just so glad you told me how you were gonna get outta here, because now, you're going to die, and I won't even have to lift a finger. And by the way, this is what you get for destroying my family…" She growled darkly, "Paige, now!"

On cue, a cloud of bright blue and white lights deposited the Charmed Ones into the vault, standing just behind Annabelle as they began to read from a piece of paper that was being held by Piper, "You burn as strong as the cruelest fire, burning deep and burning bright, take her now to her deathly pyre, and make what was wrong turn right!" The three woman took a few moments to sneer at the rhyme as it began to take effect.

"No…" Layana breathed as fierce crimson flames began to consume her, "No!" She screamed just before the fire enveloped her completely. A chilling scream echoed throughout the vault, before it too was drowned out by the booming explosion of vibrant red sparks that danced along the stone ground before fizzling out, leaving to trace of Layana's existence apart from the adamantine dagger, which had absorbed the heat of the vanquishing flames and lay unharmed on the cobbled floor.

"It's a good thing Pam gave us that spell…" Paige mused quietly, watching as the blonde in front of them walked closer to where Layana had just been vanquished.

"Take this…" Annabelle said, picking up the athame and handing it over to Piper before placing her hands on her hips, "You can use it to get out of here. Just stab the force field with it and it'll vanish. Oh, and you can keep the dagger, just in case a Phoenix tries to bother you ever again."

"Aren't you coming with us?" Piper asked with a frown, receiving a cheerful shake of the head from Annabelle as a response.

"No, something tells me that this is where I belong now." She responded sagely, taking a deep breath before exhaling with her eyes closed serenely, "It's finally over… I'm free." The mercenary said gratefully, before looking up at the Charmed Ones with one of the first genuine smiles she had had in years. "Thank you. If it wasn't for all of you, I would never have got my family back… And now I'm in charge of a whole coven, apparently!"

"How'd you figure?" Phoebe asked with a smile.

"I dunno. I just felt different the moment Layana was vanquished…" She replied mysteriously, before smiling, "I think I must have absorbed her powers or something."

"Well, in that case, I guess this is goodbye…" Piper said quietly, a bittersweet expression on her face as she held out her hand, allowing a beaming grin to pass across her features. "Good luck."

* * *

Pamela cracked her neck back and forth as she entered the apartment, squinting at the harshness of the sunlight that was pouring through the living room windows. She had spent most of the night a phone to her ear and hunched over the Book of Shadows, only getting about half an hour's sleep after she had given Piper the spell to vanquish the Phoenix High Priestess. She was so glad that it the school year was almost over, as she already sat all her finals, and she didn't need to go college for another three months.

As she began to walk down the corridor, it seemed that Keith was just waking up, as he startled her by suddenly opening the door to his room and frightening her. His hair was askew from sleep, and he squinted from the light, just like Pamela had done when she had entered. "Not now." She pleaded wearily, continuing to walk to her room. "All I want is a nice hot bath and my bed."

"When then?" He asked, stifling a yawn as he leant against the doorframe of his room, scratching the side of his face. "Because I'm leaving in two weeks, so we need to talk about this."

She let out a tired sigh as she was about to cross the threshold of her bedroom and turned around, biting her lip, "I can't." She replied softly, sighing when his head drooped down at her answer, "You have no idea how tempting it is, to just leave all of this crap behind and start a fresh with you. In fact, there's nothing I want more!"

"Then _why_ are you saying no?" He asked desperately, staring into her eyes and hoping that he could silently persuade her into changing her mind.

"Because that would be selfish of me, wouldn't it?" She said with a sad smile, cocking her head, "Dean is going to be a father any day now. He doesn't know what he's doing, neither does Gwen. I still have to repair things with Trent for the sake of my family, I need to find out what happened in my old apartment all those years ago, my aunts are on the verge of a battle that they're going to need me in, and I still have this witch hunter terrorizing the city." He opened his mouth to speak, but she cut him off firmly, "And before you say _anything_, you all can't honestly expect me to let go of the fact that his guy has my powers, can you? It's like if someone stole your gift for music. You wouldn't let it go… and neither can I." They shared a few moments of silence as Keith processed all this, "I'm sorry," She said sorrowfully, only earning a shake of the head as a response.

"One of these days, you're going to have to stop living for other people, and start living for yourself." He said firmly, turning away from her and walking down the hallway towards the kitchen to start his day.

"Damnit…" Pamela breathed under breath, gritting her teeth as she entered her room, kicking her door closed and allowing to slam shut with a bang.

* * *

_Don't forget to review!_


	36. Fools Rush In

**Fools Rush In**

Pamela stared at her tired reflection in the mirror that faced her. The harsh fluorescent light in the room gave her already paled face a ghostly look, the only ounce of colour being a deep purple bruise that was forming on her forehead; and a few dashes of red where blood wept from many small cuts. Her left arm lay limp in her lap, the bone shattered to such an extent that she couldn't even feel it anymore. She was on the verge of tears for what seemed like the umpteenth time that day, her right hand shaking slightly on the cold metal table that she was sitting at.

The door opened, the comfortable background noise of the police station flooding in for a brief second before the door was closed after the two detectives had walked in, leaving her once again the silence, "Here's your water." One of the detectives said as she put a glass of water down on the table. It was Detective Strane, the officer that had brought her into the holding room.

"Thank you." Pamela croaked in response. Talking was proving to be a tall order with a swollen lip.

"Pamela, this is my partner, Detective Barnes. He's going to ask you some questions." Strane said, presenting the man next to her. Barnes remained silent, glowering down on Pamela with cold blue-grey eyes as he sat down, although such an action seemed to disgust, as if he was displeased at the thought of lowering himself to her level.

"Can't this wait?" She asked tiredly, silently pleading with Strane through her eyes, "I need to go to the hospital and check on everyone else… They were a lot worse off than I was and I want to make sure-,"

"A man is dead, Miss Walker," Barnes cut her off sharply, "And seeing as how you seem to be the only witness that is up to talking to us right now, we had better deal with this quickly while it's still fresh in your mind." He informed her harshly, staring intently into her eyes as if she had a replay of what happened in her pupils. "Or, you know, before you get a chance to formulate a story."

Pamela's eyes narrowed, "You're talking to me like I'm a criminal." She growled, receiving no answer from either cop, "Alright, you want the full story? I'll give it you." She said venomously, looking from one detective to another, "It all started this afternoon…"

* * *

Dean was grinning from ear to ear as he massaged Gwen's stomach, his ear pressed against her bump as he did so. "Oh, yeah, now I definitely know for sure." He said firmly, raising his head and smiling at Gwen, who had watched her boyfriend's behaviour in deep amusement for the last few minutes, "We're having a boy for sure. I can feel it!" He beamed, looking down at her stomach again, "Hey, my little boy! This is your dad!" He murmured excitedly to her belly, causing Gwen to roll her eyes and let out a small laugh.

"You know, I should have got this on tape, because Pam is never going to believe that you were talking to my stomach!" She said in an elated tone, leaning back on the sofa and staring at the ceiling. "It's weird. I always thought that getting pregnant at this age would be Hell on Earth, but…" She bought her head back up, smiling at Dean, "I've been so happy these past few months, its unreal."

"Me too." Dean said back, still grinning as he leaned in and kissed her deeply, placing his hand on her face and gently cupping her cheek.

They were interrupted when the door opened, allowing Pamela to enter. She made a beeline for the kitchen, smiling brightly at the couple before she bent down behind the fridge door, out of sight, "Hey!" She called out cheerily, remerging with a bottle of water in her hand, "What are you guys up to?"

"Uh… nothing." Dean replied with a frown as he sat up properly on the sofa, eyeing his sister with a curious stare, "So… Did Keith get on his plane alright?" He asked nervously, crouching a little he as spoke. Keith's flight had been earlier that afternoon, and Dean had been expecting Pamela to be a terrible mood when she came back.

"Yeah, I'm assuming so." She took a swig of her water, shrugging casually, "Unless he tripped in the tunnel to the plane, which is actually pretty likely as its just one big tunnel made up from tons of little tunnels and they have bumps on the floor where they connect and you could easily trip on one of those as you walk." She responded, her words coming out of her mouth faster than she could form them. "Anyway, I'm gonna get changed. I just put anything on this morning because I was in a hurry to help Keith finish packing and these clothes stink! Catch you crazy kids in a few!" She shouted perkily as she vanished down the hallway, leaving both of them dazed from her behaviour.

"Did she just act insanely happy around you guys as well?" Jordann asked as she walked in through the open door, Trent and McKenzie following in after her, "Because I could have sworn I just heard her say 'Catch you crazy kids in a few!'" She said sourly, staring in the direction Pamela had vanished in.

"Oh, yeah!" Dean exclaimed, getting up off the couch and walking towards them, "I take it her goodbye with Keith went pretty smoothly?"

"On the surface, yeah." Trent replied, leaning on the kitchen counter, "But come on, this is Pam we're dealing with here. You may not remember this because you were too young at the time, but when she was eight, Dad took her to the movies on the opening day of _Practical Magic_, only to find out that they were fully booked until the next day. She acted completely fine with it for the rest of the day, and then in the middle of the night, Mom found her in the bathroom pulling her hair out." He stood up to his full height, reliving the memory with a slight cringe. "This is how Pam reacts to this kind of stuff. She'll either get angry, or she'll suppress it all and press the self-destruct button at a later date."

"So, what are you saying? That we should take turns watching her tonight to make sure she doesn't start pulling out her hair?" McKenzie asked sarcastically with a raised eyebrow, "She's twenty one; I don't think she's going to do something like that. Besides, Keith leaving means you guys have now got a room for your baby." She said with a smile, turning to the couple on the sofa, "When are you due anyway?"

"Any day now." Gwen replied cheerily, rubbing her stomach with a small smile on her face. "Now that we're this far down the road, I just want to get it over and done with already so I can start being a mother."

"And so I can start being an uncle!" Trent replied jovially, swinging an arm McKenzie's hips all of a sudden and catching her off guard with a rushed kiss. Her eyes widened in surprise, before she realized what was happening and eased herself into it, placing her arms around his neck and returning the kiss with just as much passion.

Jordann rolled her eyes at another sudden display of passion from the couple. They had been happening more and more recently, and with Trent being a frequent visitor in her apartment due to her roommate, the feral was starting to get sick of it. She turned to Dean and Gwen, hoping to share her disgust at this with someone else, only to find that they had followed suit and were now in a lip lock, "Okay," Jordann said sourly, "Now _I'm_ going to have to start pulling out my hair!"

* * *

"You were listening in?" Barnes asked with one eyebrow raised questioningly

"My friends love to psychoanalyze me." Pamela responded bluntly, "I don't see how me eavesdropping on their latest session is any bigger a breach of trust than what they were doing to me, but I don't really care what you think. I need to leave now." She snapped with sarcastic politeness, pushing herself into a standing position by putting her right hand on the desk while her left arm hung limp at her side.

"Sit down, Miss Walker," He droned, looking up at her with a hard stare and forcing her to lower herself into the chair again with a frustrated sigh.

Barnes opened the beige folder before him and produced a photograph, sliding it along the metal table so it was in front of her. Pamela's heart began to thump when she saw what it was of. A large, silver pistol lay on a dirty wooden floor, a crime scene investigation measurement marker next to it, and a bloody handprint on the handle, as if the person holding it had been covered in it. This caused her to look down at her own palms, which had been dyed a pale red from dried in blood. "We recovered this gun at the crime scene. It's registered to your name." He said darkly, "We also did a gun shot residue test on everyone we found with you. Basically, we see if you have any gunpowder on your hands from firing a gun recently. Your test was the only one that came back positive. Care to explain that?"

Before she could answer, Detective Strane reentered; her face apologetic for interrupting the interview. Pamela's face instantly regained hope at the sight of the woman, who seemed to be a lot more sympathetic than her partner, "Did you find out how my brother is?" She said desperately, her eyes pleading with the detective to give her the information she wanted.

"… He's still in surgery." Strane replied quietly, looking down at her clasped hands awkwardly.

"Well, what about Gwen?" She asked, her voice getting higher along with her stress.

"Who?"

"Gwen!" Pamela repeated, her brow arching in anger, "You know, the pregnant girl you who was probably scared to _death_?" She resisted the urge to stand up and be at eye level with this example of incompetence, as she knew she wouldn't be able to manage it without causing herself considerable pain. Especially since having lost her temper for a brief second and letting her breathing become erratic, she was pretty sure that one of her ribs was broken.

"Oh! The pregnant girl!" Strane stammered, suddenly standing to attention as if she had just been scolded by her superior, "She's-,"

"I think that's enough personal questions, Miss Walker." Barnes snapped, steamrolling over his colleague's words, "Now, would you care to answer _my_ questions?" He asked hotly, a sneer appearing on his face.

Pamela's gaze flickered back to Strane, who looked a little peeved at her partner completely ignoring her skills as a detective, before she turned back to Barnes, her eyes hardening to the colour of ice under this light, "I was nearly killed in a mugging a few months ago." She replied, pointing to the everlasting scar that run through her face, "I bought the gun for protection. And yes," She said wearily, "I did fire the gun; I'm not going to deny that."

"The man that you shot…" Barnes began, sliding another crime scene photo towards her that made her skin lose all its colour almost instantly and suddenly gave her the urge to vomit onto the table. She had to look away from it as the detective continued to berate her, "Was he the man that mugged you? Is that why you shot him?" He asked coldly, glaring at the side of her head before she turned to him to answer.

"No and no."

* * *

Pamela, having now changed into a pair of faded black jeans and a dark grey waistcoat top, paced her room in a manic fashion. The notebook in which she had transcribed parts of the Book of Shadows before coming to New York was open in her hand as she walked around her bed. She held her free hand upwards, spinning it round continuously as she muttered under her breath, trying to commit something to memory before she gave a sigh and threw the notebook onto the bed, soon joining it with a thud. She stared at the ceiling, her hands resting on her stomach and her fingers drumming against her body before she turned slightly to the picture on her nightstand. "Don't look at me like that." She said to the picture. It was of Jordann, Keith and Trent at Bridget's twenty first birthday party a month ago. Her eyes focused in on Keith, who looked more startled than anything else, "I'm only doing what you told me to…" She murmured, closing her eyes and exhaling gently.

"_Do you remember what you promised me last night?" Keith asked her, ducking slightly so he could put the strap of his shoulder bag over his head and let it rest against his neck. The mutant raised an inquisitive eyebrow when she didn't respond, and placed his hands on the strap of his bag with a smile, "Okay, well, I'll refresh your memory. You promised that you were going to drop this witch hunter thing for a little while and focus on something else."_

_Pamela sighed and turned her head away from him, putting her hands on her hips, "I don't remember making such a deal." She said flatly with a hint of amusement, staring at the floor until he placed his hand under her chin and turned her head back to him, forcing her to look into his stormy eyes._

"_I'm serious." He said darkly, "I don't want you going after this guy and getting yourself killed just because you didn't have the sense to deal with this properly. Besides…" He took his hand away from her face, smiling again, "You're probably nothing in a fight without me coming to the rescue."_

_She scoffed at this, shaking her head with a grin, "You wish!" She said, before the laugher subsided, "I'll think about it, okay?"_

"_No. I want you to promise me that you'll find something else."_

"_Keith come on-,"_

"_No! Promise me!"_

"_Alright, fine! I promise!"_

"Pam?"

The witch's eyes blinked a few times at the disturbance, bringing her out of her daydream as she rolled over in the bed to face whoever was standing at the door. "Oh, hey." She greeted Trent, swinging her legs over the side of the bed and facing him properly. "What's up?" She asked with a bright smile, casually brushing her notebook behind her back so he wouldn't see the numerous glyphs she had drawn on the front of it for protection.

"Mac and I are going across to Brooklyn to visit her sick aunt, but we're gonna be back at around seven, so I was thinking we could all meet up for dinner or something." His eyes twinkled when he grinned at her, "It'll be my treat, so you don't have to pay for anything." He said, leaning against the doorframe and folding his arms, raising an eyebrow, "Come on, fine wine, good company, great food… it'll be fun."

Pamela sniggered slightly, "And where did you get all the money to pay for this? You're a cop in training; you're not exactly on the world's biggest salary." She said with an inquisitive frown, waiting for an answer.

Trent shifted uncomfortably, standing up properly and not using the doorframe for support, "… My trust fund kicked in when I turned twenty one a few years ago. I don't use it that much, but I dip into it now and again for the odd thing. Mom and Dad left the three of us one each. The last big thing I used it for was my student loans… Oh, and to pay for my car."

"Oh…" Pamela said, her face lighting up in realization, "That's probably what all those letters from the bank have been about since I turned twenty one." She caught his confused stare and saw he required an explanation, "They basically send me polite letters all the time to tell me I'm overdrawn, which no one likes to hear."

Trent chuckled a little, "Alright, so are you coming or not?" He sighed when he could see the clear hesitation in her eyes before she looked down at her lap, "Look, I'm not going to force you, but it's better just to swallow the sadness and get on with your life, than just wallow in it. Trust me."

"So, swallow, not wallow?" She replied with an amused smirk, which he returned.

"Exactly." He replied with another grin, "So, what do you say?"

"Alright then."

* * *

"Why are you trying to drown us in this irrelevant garbage?" Barnes snapped, running both hands through his hair before standing up suddenly, slamming his hands down the desk and boring his stare into her head as Pamela looked away from him, "Just tell me what happened that led to this man…" He prodded the crime scene photo, "Being shot dead by you."

"You're a lousy interrogator." Pamela spat, leaning forward and returning his glare with double the ferocity, "I'm sitting here, telling you everything that happened, and you keep stomping all over my words. Here's tip, if you want someone to tell you something, don't interrupt them with hissy fits every five seconds!" Her eyes shifted to Strane, who was leaning against the presumably two way mirror, "How do you manage to _work_ with this diva?"

Strane suppressed a snigger when her partner's face went crimson. Barnes shook his head with an angry sigh and walked over to his fellow detective, whispering something in her ear, before storming out of the room, glaring heatedly at Pamela before leaving, slamming the door viciously as he went. The two women exchanged a glance as Strane sat down in her colleague's former seat, looking down at the folder.

"Okay, just pick up where you left off." She said calmly, "I'll listen without any unnecessary interruptions." She said; writing down a few notes on a piece of paper in the folder before looking up, ready to listen.

"Well, there's not really much to tell about the next few hours." Pamela responded, "I basically just hung around the apartment until we had to go and meet everyone else. I help my brother and his girlfriend pick out a few baby names, wrote a little bit of my column. It's nothing big, just a little blurb in the back pages of the newspaper. Uh… dinner was pretty uneventful too, until…"

"Until…?"

Pamela hesitated, cringing a little. "… Well, after I got mugged, a lot of my friends were murdered." She stated sadly, "And the fact that they were all witches as well-,"

"Wait a minute, witches?" Strane asked with a frown, giving Pamela an odd glance.

"It's not like we make potions and think we have magical powers or anything." She joked as a reply, "Witchcraft is more about herbal medicine, and sisterhood aspect of sharing the same believes as so many other people. It's more a way of life, than a label." She explained. Past encounters with the police never went well with Halliwells, so Pamela thought she would try a different tactic and get the witch thing out in the open immediately, just not tell the entire truth about it. "Anyway, my witch friends were being murdered, so the rest of us decided to set up a system, where if one of us felt like we were in danger, we could contact everyone at the same time and come together. You know, safety in numbers."

"So, the recent string of young female murders lately… all of these people have been a part of Wicca?" Strane asked politely, making Pamela smile inwardly. She clearly just the truth, and didn't judge what she uncovered along the way.

"Some males too, but yeah. He seemed to be going after people who were witches, so we set up this system." Pamela looked down at her lap, "And it was because of that system that I left the restaurant a little early…"

* * *

"Thank you." Pamela threw a bill into the front seat of the taxi as she got out onto the curb, closing the door behind her and letting it drive off. The witch looked up into the twilight sky, searching for the serene comfort she usually found within the golden hue that fell across the city at this time in a summer evening. It did nothing for her tonight. In fact, it made her feel even less at ease. The sky looked like it was on fire. Something wasn't right.

She noticed her friend Valarie sitting on the sidewalk across the street, isolated from the mob that had gathered around the main entrance to the apartment complex. At the sight of the fellow witch, Pamela's shoulders instantly drooped. The feelings of shock and overwhelming guilt, so paralyzing that you couldn't even stand. She knew exactly what Valarie was going through, because she had gone through it when she had found out that Madison had been killed. "Val, what happened to Billie? I got your message." She knelt down in front of her friend, her chocolate skin unnaturally pale, something that was clear even in this hour of dim light.

"It all happened so fast." Valarie whispered; her eyes wide and bloodshot. "I called for her whitelighter, but he couldn't do anything… The window just smashed and then she was…" Valarie's jaw quivered, before she swallowed slowly, trying to suppress her tears so she could talk properly. "He shot her." She said finally, "He must have either blessed the bullet that killed her, or he just blessed the gun… Either way, her whitelighter wasn't able to heal her. Then we wasted an hour trying to figure out what to do…"

"Oh, you gotta be kidding me… Guns?" Pamela breathed tiredly. He had escalated to guns. He wasn't even giving his victims a chance of survival anymore.

They both turned when the crowd seemed to part, making way for the paramedics who were coming out the building. They were wheeling out a body bag on a gurney, causing both witches to flinch when the mass of black vinyl shifted violently due to gurney being brought down off the sidewalk in a rather callous manner before being put into the back of the ambulance. There were no sirens, and the crowd began to disperse once the vehicle began to drive away. Nothing but silence. "There's something else too…"

Pamela turned back to her distraught friend, frowning, "What is it?"

Valarie looked down into her jacket, fishing in one of her pockets and producing her cellphone. She flipped it open and began to press the buttons, "I got this voicemail the moment when we walked into Billie's apartment. I turned around to tell her about it, and… that's when it happened."

"Three guesses where he called from…" She looked up to the roof of the building across from the apartment complex, glaring intensely at it as if the witch hunter was still up there, taunting her. She pressed the phone to her ear and listened to the voicemail. It was short, but it was enough to make Pamela go pale almost immediately. Her mouth fell open, and her breathing instantly became ragged. She never thought that three little words could scare her so much.

"It ends tonight."

* * *

Pamela didn't even register the apartment door opening as she sprinkled viper ashes into the bubbling potion. Her eyes gleamed with silent mania as she didn't look up to see who had entered, focusing on the concoction in front of her before looking forward to the other potion that was simmering on the other part of the stove. Finally bringing her gaze up, she saw Dean with Gwen, who looking at the jars of ingredients littered around her, staring wide eyed at them. "What _is_ all this stuff?" She asked incredulously, grimacing at the stench emanating from the pots.

"Herbal medicine, feeling kinda down." Pamela gave her rehearsed answer robotically, going back to her potion making, not taking notice of her brother's clear panic at this blatant display of witchcraft.

"Uh… Honey, why don't you go out into the balcony and get away from the smell of this stuff?" Dean suggested with a beaming smile, gently taking away the jar in her hand before she could read what it said on the label. "Go on, I'll join you in a minute." He guided her in the direction of the large sliding doors, watching her walk off to the other side of the room to open them before turning back to his sister, "Okay, I know you've been through a lot today. I'm not denying that. But have you completely flipped your lid?"

"Just because you like denying who you are, doesn't mean I do." She said in a matter of fact tone, once again not even giving him eye contact as she stirred the potion closest to Dean. She looked up at him when she heard am angry sigh, realizing that she had hit a sensitive spot, "Look, Dean, I'm sorry, but right now, you choosing to hide your demonic genetics from your girlfriend is the least of my problems."

"I thought Keith told you to lay off this witch hunter thing. Why are you doing this?"

"Keith told you about that? Why?"

"Oh, come on, like he was going to trust _you_ to restrain your own determination." Dean replied sourly with a roll of his eyes, a move that Pamela was certain he had got from her. "You know what? I'm not going to let you do this." He said firmly, lifting the pot closest to him by the handle and walking towards the sink.

"No!" She boomed with a raised voice, putting her hand up to make him stop. "It's not for the witch hunter, alright?" She sighed as he stopped, narrowing his eyes and placing the pot down on the counter, "It's so I can find out what happened to Stewart and Joanna…"

Dean stared at her for a few seconds, before silently lifting the potion pot up once again and returning it to the fire it had been sitting upon. "_What?_"

"I wasn't going to tell you until I knew it had worked, but I couldn't have you going and destroying the last two hours of my life…" She gestured at the pot he had picked up.

"Take me with you." Dean suddenly urged softly, surprising his sister, as he was usually so adamant about staying away from anything to do with magic, "I don't care what you're doing. Whether you're going to go into a trance, you're gonna go back in time… I don't care, I want to see. Trent should too. The three of us should do this together, we deserve this."

"I know, believe me," Pamela replied strongly, trying to make sure that they both remained calm, "But I just don't have the power anymore. That's why I'm making all these potions. If I was at full strength, then I wouldn't need all the potions, but I'm not and I do, so I can barely make this spell affect me, let alone three people." She stared sorrowfully at his bowed head, realizing that this news must be devastating for him, as he too had sought the truth for so long, "I will tell you every detail, alright?"

"Why do you even need to do this at all? Why don't you wait until you're back up at full power until you do anything?"

"Because it's not a matter of waiting for my powers to return, I need to kill the witch hunter to get them back." Pamela said with a small smirk, "And since I'm apparently off limits from going after him, I need something to distract myself. Besides, this has been eating away at me for so long… I can't just let this opportunity pass by without doing something."

He stared at her, his brow creased in frustration as his jaw clenched, "You'll tell me every detail?"

"Every _single_ detail."

* * *

"Wait, hold on," Strane held up her hand, frowning curiously at what Pamela had just relayed to her. She looked up from the file, where she was scribbling furiously what she was being told in note form, "You just said that you were making herbal concoction to help you remember what happened to your foster parents eight years ago. Why did you think that something like that would work above everything else?"

"The thing that I was making gives off a special kind of aromatic smoke." Pamela explained; wincing as she accidentally scraped her teeth against her injured lip, "It's kind of like incense. The smell lets you relax, eases your mind, and allows you to remember things that you thought you had forgotten."

"It lets you relax?"

"I wasn't high, if that's what you're asking." Pamela replied sharply, glaring at the detective for even suggesting it.

"Okay, so what happened after that?"

Pamela froze up at this question and began to visibly shake. Raising her hand up to her face, she nursed her bloody lip with handkerchief once again, before heaving a sigh as tears prickled her eyes, "… I remembered…"

* * *

She struck the match against the side of the box, her eyes following the tiny flicker of light in her darkened room as she held it against the wick of the final candle that remained unlit. Pamela bit her lip nervously as she blew out the match and placed it on the metal tray that her ritual urn was on, kneeling down in front of it and making sure that all five candles were positioned correctly, before picking up the small Tupperware box next to her. "When you invoke time, you can pretty much do anything…" She murmured to herself.

Opening the box, she cringed at the pile of grey-black muck that was within. All she had done was wipe her hand along the mantelpiece in the Walker's bedroom, expecting just a pile of dust, not all this. It was better for the spell through. It would give it more power if the dirt was thicker. And anything that ensured the success of this spell was a positive in her book.

After all, she couldn't go out tonight and face the witch hunter with this still hanging over her head.

She dipped her hand into the box, filling her fist with the ancient mixture and held it over the urn, slowly beginning to sprinkle it into the potion that she had been working on earlier, "Dust and dirt, soot and grime, give to me my sands of time, heed the words within my rhyme, and take me back to the scene of the crime…"

As the dirt first fell from her hand, it began to sparkle with a golden light during her chant. Once she had emptied her palm, a pulse of dazzling energy shot from the depths of the pot, blinding the Halliwell witch and forcing her cover her eyes from the blast. She was suddenly overcome with an odd sensation, as if her insides were being sloshed around inside her like a washing machine. It only lasted a few seconds, and when she brought her arms away from her face, she was no longer in her room, and she was no longer sitting.

Pamela was surrounded by an eerie silence and it was now, in the dead of night, she realized that even in its prime the Walker apartment had been extremely creepy to be in. She stood at the end of the hallway, the flawless wooden floor gleaming in the moonlight that was flooding in from the dining room to her right. The piano stood proudly, perfect, nothing like its current state where it lay in pieces after Keith was thrown through it. Some of Dean's toys were splayed out on the marble floor of the main room, bringing back fond memories that were so strong she almost wanted to go into the dining room, sit on the floor, and play with the toys herself, but she was here for a reason.

She walked down the hallway for a few feet before turning to the left and into the Walker's bedroom. Her chest tightened immediately when she saw them both, alive and well through the crack in the doorway. Almost instantly, the familiar scent of perfume that she could sometimes smell in the present day apartment assaulted her senses, making her close her eyes as tears began to flow from being hit with such a memory.

"Joanna, would you please just come to bed?" Stewart beckoned her irritably from the bed as Pamela entered. She assumed that they couldn't see her, or were even aware of her presence, as neither of them looked up when she pushed the door open and walked in, "Trent always does this after we have an argument with him, ever since he learned how to drive…" He said grumpily before lying back in the bed and tightly shutting his eyes, making Pamela snigger and roll her eyes. He was always grumpy if he was tired, like a child.

"I know…" Joanna replied, still not changed for bed, "It was just something in his eyes before he left. I hope he doesn't do anything stupid… And even more than that, I don't him to go off to college in the fall hating our guts."

"He shoved Pam to the floor in the dining room!" Stewart replied indignantly, not even opening his eyes, "You know how dangerous that could have been. What if she had hit her head on that marble? Or what if she had decided to use her powers on him? Although I can't say I would have blamed her in that situation. Not to mention, she didn't even do anything to provoke him as far as we know. And there's a five year gap between them, so even if she did do something, he should have known better than to abuse his obvious strength advantage. Let it go, Jo, and come to bed."

"He's always been jealous of the attention we gave Pam and Dean." Joanna continued, ignoring her husband, "He's never seen that he didn't need us as much as they did. From his point of view, they stole his parents. He's never treated them with any love…" Joanna looked out the window, her body language making her despair clear. "I feel like such a failure."

Pamela frowned at this information. She may have forgotten a lot of her childhood, but she never remembered Trent treating her and Dean horribly. She couldn't say for certain, but this just couldn't be true. They had all got along so well recently, and if what Joanna was saying was true, then Trent would never remotely like them, let alone love them.

Before Stewart could respond to his wife's statement, the sound of the front door opening echoed throughout the apartment, causing both Walkers to turn to the door of their bedroom. With an angry sigh, Stewart rose from the bed, "Get Pam and Dean, and stay in here. I'm going to deal with him once and for all." He snapped, leaving the room.

Pamela gave chase to him, briefly looking back to see Joanna entering Dean's room before resuming her tailing of her foster father, who had just slammed the heel of his hand into the wall, turning on the light in the foyer and giving the witch a fright at what she saw as a consequence.

A younger Trent stood there, just closing the door as he let two other men in. The three of them together didn't look that menacing, they looked rather normal. Both of them seemed to be a little older than Trent, with rough faces and small eyes. The only things that separated them were their height and their hair, the taller one having no hair, and the short one having a burst of black hair.

"Trent, what have we told you about having friends over after midnight?" Stewart droned, folding his arms, clearly not intimidated by the duo his son had brought into his house.

"They aren't my friends, Dad." Trent replied with a smirk, resting his hands on their shoulders, "They're my brothers in arms, charged with one very important purpose: To purge the world of all its filthy, disgusting evils." He said with disdain, grimacing as if he could taste his own words. "You see, around a year after you decided to spread your wealth and adopt two strangers into our house, I did a little research, and do you want to do what I found, Dad?"

Pamela's heart sank, and she leant on the wall for support as her legs began to betray her. It couldn't be.

"What?" Stewart questioned sharply, snarling at his son.

"Our very own Pam and Dean are evil." Trent responded simply, "Sure, Dean's evil, but at least his kind embraces it. Demons are true to themselves, which gives them a sliver of dignity and something to respect. Witches on the other hand…" He let out a sick laugh, "I can't believe I lived with one for so long… The dirt will probably never come off." He turned to his father, giving him a frightening stare, "You see, pops, witches try and blend in with normal people, except they're not normal. They're always using their powers to change the concept of normal so they fit into it. They're human filth. Hell, they're not even human. They're just filth." He took a few steps forward, a nauseating smirk appearing on his face, "So, Dad, are you going to be the guardian of the garbage, or are you going to step aside and let us take the trash out?"

Stewart swallowed hard, his eyes flickering between the two men that stood behind his son. All of a sudden, his fist swung at Trent's face, throwing him into the table in the foyer and knocking over a vase, "I don't know where the hell your mother and I went wrong with you, but we're certainly not going to repeat those mistakes on those two _amazing_ kids."

Trent touched his bloody lip as he recovered, chuckling slightly, before suddenly lunging at his father, his blade drawn, and throwing it into Stewart's gut. Blood immediately began pouring out onto Trent's hands, before he shoved his father to the ground with a thud. "I hate getting good blades dirty for no reason…" He growled; stepping on his father's wound and watching in sadistic pleasure as the light vanished from his eyes.

"No!" Pamela screamed, finally finding her strength and running to him, dropping to her knees and skidding along the smooth wood to his side. She traced Stewart's pale face in the air around it, as she knew she wouldn't be to function anymore if she saw her hand go right through his face. She whipped her head around to Trent, who was still looking down at dead father, "What the _hell_ is the _matter_ with you?" She shrieked, angry tears pouring down her cheeks, "You're a monster! You _bastard_!"

"C'mon, my mom's probably protecting them in the bedroom," Trent said darkly to his partners, not even hearing Pamela as he began to walk down the corridor towards the bedroom.

"No…" Pamela breathed through her tears, "No!" She scrambled to her feet and ran down the hallway, ignoring the unpleasant sensation of her incorporeal body passing through three people as she overtook them, running to the bedroom where Joanna was kneeling down in front of the children, her back to the door, "Please! You have to get out of here! He's going to _kill_ you! _Run_!" Her throat was burning from the volume she was shouting at. She knew no one could hear her, but it didn't stop her from trying, "Run! You're going to _die_! _Please_, just run!"

"Mom, get out of my way." Trent growled menacingly from the doorway, holding up his bloody knife for show. Joanna turned and stood in front of Pamela and Dean, holding her arms back slightly in an attempt to protect them. "I already tried to explain things to Dad, but he wouldn't listen. He never did…"

"You killed your father…?" She asked, barely able to get the words out, "What is _wrong_ with you?" She suddenly screamed, causing the two children behind to cower even more, tears beginning to spring from their faces as they realized their foster father was never coming back.

A range of emotions crossed Trent's face within a few seconds. First, it was the crashing disappointment of his mother betraying him, when she had been the parent he had loved the most. Then, it was of unfathomable anger, "You're taking his side too?" He asked manically, suddenly running at his mother putting his hand under her chin as he spun her around so she was facing Pamela and Dean, "Then you'll die too, and they're going to watch…" With one brutally swift motion, he slashed her neck, sending blood spurting across the two children and all over the floor in an arc shape before dropping her to the floor, "Traitors…" He growled, before a large energy ball suddenly plowed into his shoulder, sending him flying back into the wall before crashing down onto the floor.

The younger Pamela looked to her side and took a few steps back when she saw that Dean's skin had turned a dark blue, a luminous green tribal mark glowing furiously on the side of his small face. He bared his enlarged teeth at the two other witch hunters, before wheeling his arm back and releasing an energy ball that even an adult demon would have trouble throwing, casting them back and away from the door also.

In fear for her life, the young girl used the chaos to make a run for it, "No! Wait!" Pamela shouted after her past self, not wanting her to see Stewart's dead body. It was too late, the younger version of herself lingered in the foyer for a few seconds, before she heard the window smash, presumably Dean escaping in his demonic form. Fresh tears flowed down her face before she ran to the door, racing out of the apartment and running as fast as she could.

* * *

Pamela was back in the apartment, sitting the gloomy darkness of her room. The candles had burned out in her absence, and tears still run down her cheeks at what she had witnessed. Trent was the witch hunter. He had killed his parents because they had tried to protect her from him. This was all her fault. All the deaths that had occurred recently, all the friends she had lost, the reason her life was like this. It was all her fault. Her being a witch had made Trent this way.

She jumped with fright when a muffled banging suddenly reached her ears. She turned around, and saw light pour in through the gap at the bottom of the door, telling her that Dean was seeing to it. Her eyes widened as she started to apply her newfound knowledge to what was happening, and she got to her feet almost instantly, "No, Dean! Don't!" She shouted.

"What? Why? What's going on? Have you been crying?" He asked, noticing the tear tracks on her face before the banging on the front door suddenly started up again, this time making both of them jump as a groggy Gwen joined them in the living room, clearly just waking up.

"Pam! Open the door! _Please!_" McKenzie's panicked shrieks came from behind the door. At the sound of her distressed friend, Pamela went towards the door and looked through the peephole before immediately undoing the latch and letting the mutant tumble into the apartment. She was absolutely hysterical with panic, nearly crashing straight into the sofa as she flew in, desperate not to be alone for another second. "It's Trent! He's the witch hunter!" She screamed, staying still long enough for them to see that her bare feet where bleeding badly. She had run here without any shoes.

"Mac…" Pamela murmured, going up to her friend and holding her head at the sides, "Mac!" She said with slightly more authority, stilling the girl's manic sobbing for a second, "You need to tell me what happened so I can stop him. Where did he go? Where's Jordann?" At this question, McKenzie dissolved into crying once again, causing Pamela's heart to skip a beat, "I she-?"

"I don't know!" She cried, wincing with each step as she was guided to the sofa so she wouldn't have to stand on her torn up feet for any longer. "I…. I just got up for a glass of water and he was there with a knife and-and… an amulet around his neck." She reached up to own neck, massaging it gently and bringing attention to the angry red colour her skin around there had become, "I tried to scream but then he choked me then Jordann came out of nowhere and threw him off me and then they started fighting…" She didn't seem to realize she was babbling as she attempted to calm down her breathing, "I just ran! I don't know what happened to her… Oh, God, if she's dead…"

"Don't think like that, alright? None of this is your fault. The only person whose fault this is, is Trent, okay?" Pamela assured her, looking deep into her bleary eyes, "Look, Jordann was one of the strongest ferals of her kind; her powers would have been able to protect her regardless of that amulet, so-,"

"Wait a minute!" Dean suddenly bellowed, "Trent… He's _not_ a killer. He can't be the witch hunter. He just isn't, alright? He's our brother, Pam!" He shouted, apparently forgetting Gwen was even there with them, slowly getting paler and paler as she listened to the people she thought she knew talk as if they were insane.

"He's not our brother." Pamela growled, "He's a monster. He killed Stewart and Joanna because they tried to protect us. I saw it when I cast the spell…"

"Okay!" Gwen suddenly cut through, placing both hands on the kitchen counter as she looked at the trio before her, "Is this like one big massive prank to freak me out? Because I gotta tell you, I'm not finding it funny and neither is the baby." She said breathlessly, her eyes flickering for a brief second and causing to Dean to rush to her side, letting his sister slide by him and storm off down the hallway.

"Pam! Wait!"

As Dean entered her room, he saw that she was leaning out of her window. Before he could even inquire why, he got his answer. "Arc!" She bellowed out into the night sky, leaving her window open as she turned around to her bed and vanished from Dean's sight. He could hear things being shifted around, before she finally reemerged from underneath the bed, making him recoil back in fear at what he saw in her hand. "Pam, what… what the hell are you doing that?"

"Protecting myself…" She replied darkly, not looking up from the gun in her hands as she took out the magazine to make sure it was fully loaded, before slotting it back into place with a resounding click. As she did, her hair was blown into her face by Arc whooshing into the room, landing gently on the edge of the bed, somehow not breaking it even due to the fact that he was made of stone.

"You called me, Miss?" The gargoyle questioned politely.

"Yeah, get ready to fight. I'm going to need you."

"Pam! Would you please just stop for a second?" Dean protested, rubbing his head as he tried to gather his thoughts, "Even if what you're saying is true, you can't just go and kill him! He's our brother! We've known him for years. We need to turn him into the police or something… I'm going to call the police…" He said, beginning to walk off before he heard the gun cock.

"Don't." Pamela ordered firmly, still making sure the gun was ready for use, "First of all…" She looked up, "What I'm saying is true; I saw it with my own eyes. And second of all, I'm not killing him, Dean. Killing is when you take the life of a human being, and vanquishing is when you take the life of a monster, therefore, I'm vanquishing him." She grabbed her jacket and swung it around her shoulders, slipping the gun into one of its pockets as Arc floated along behind her, "Dean, get out of my way."

"No! I-I can't accept this! There has to be an explanation!"

"You want an explanation? Alright, you did ask for every detail after all. That night, when he came to kill us, he was met with resistance in the form of our foster parents. The moment that they put up a fight, he killed him." She was slowly advancing on him, making him walk backwards towards the door as she did, "Stewart was the first to go. He got one good punch in, then Trent stabbed him, dropped him to the floor, and stepped on his wound to make his death even more painful. Next? Was Joanna. The very moment she voiced problems with his actions, he took his knife and _ripped_ through her throat, covering the two of us in blood because we had been standing behind her as she been trying to protect-,"

"_Stop it!_" He suddenly shouted, angry tears beginning to sprout from his eyes as he dug his nails into the doorframe he had grabbed onto to balance himself.

"Look after Mac, and call Bridget, tell her what's happened, and tell her that she needs to get her ass back into the city, pronto." Those were her final words before she stormed past him, Arc following obediently behind her, getting led to battle as they left the apartment, ignoring Gwen's near panic attack when she saw what she had once referred to as the "fugly statue" flying and talking.

"_God, I really need you right now, Keith…"_

* * *

There really was only one place he could be. After all, his problem was with her, and there was no better a place to end it all than in the place where it had started.

Pamela walked wearily into the Walker apartment. It seemed to be even more terrifying now that it had been when she had seen what had happened all those years ago. It was freezing, which was odd, as they were in the height of summer and the heat would always get everywhere. It wasn't until after a few seconds she realized that she was sweating, her palms clammy to the touch. Her senses were all over the place.

She decided to keep her line of sight strictly linear, not wanting to look down at the floor and see the blood pool where Stewart had died in the foyer, her hand in her pocket all the way, clenching to the handle of the gun as if it was the only thing keeping her anchored to her composure. Her only comfort was the gargoyle that she knew was close by, and the fact that she knew that he was slinking around in the darkness was the only thing that stopped her from flinching and turning around at every tiny noise or flicker of movement out of the corner of her eye.

The witch stopped dead when a blood curdling scream echoed through the apartment, bouncing off all the walls and surrounding her. Her blood run cold instantly, causing another shiver to travel up her spine and send her into another shaking fit. It had come from the large dining room, the main room of the apartment. She pursed her lips, trying to swallow her terror as she neared the doorway. That had been Jordann screaming. She knew it.

The moonlight poured into the long room, illuminating Trent's skin in such a way that he looked like the walking dead. He didn't even look up from his project as Pamela entered the room, "You know, I really should gag you, but to tell you the truth…" He leaned into Jordann's ear as she weakly struggled against the ropes that were binding her to the chair, "… I _love_ it when you scream." He growled with the same sadistic smirk Pamela had saw during her spell, before he took the knife he was holding and took it across Jordann's exposed arm, adding another bleeding welt to the many that now littered her arms, face, and the exposed part of her chest. Another chilling scream filled the air as tears flowed down her face, running through her bloody cuts and probably causing them to sting. She was still in her pajamas, still with bare feet. She hadn't been prepared for the torture she was now facing, "What about you, Pammy?" He asked causally, finally turning her way with a smile, "Are you a screamer? I wouldn't imagine you are; you're far too proud for that."

Pamela didn't even respond. She glanced at her friend, who looked like she would rather take death over anymore of this torture, and immediately, her soul all but shattered. She then turned to Trent, whose eyes were dancing with malevolent glee. Her jaw quivered in a mixture of rage and fear. All she had to do was keep him talking, and it would all be over. "How did you do it?" She croaked weakly.

"What the devil are you talking about?" He asked brightly, happy curiosity all over his face.

"When I was first attacked, you were in Mac and Jordann's apartment with everyone else." She explained, her eyes narrowing as she took a step forward, "How did you manage to attack me while you were up there entertaining guests at the same time?" She looked at the window that stood far behind Trent to his left, seeing the silhouette of a gargoyle against the misty glass.

"Oh, I wasn't me that attacked you." He responded simply, "You see, I always planned to do it like this… holding one of your friends hostage and torturing them while you looked on helplessly, so I couldn't have you figuring me out too soon. So, I got one of good friends to inflict a permanent wound on you with one of my blessed weapons so I would be the one who got your powers. I struck lucky when I came back to New York and you weren't around. It gave me some time to get stuck into your friends without you around to cast suspicion on me before they learnt to trust me. It was just a matter of who was more receptive to me. Jordann here wasn't interested," He laid a hand on her shoulder, causing her to flinch, "But McKenzie… She was so desperate for anyone to love her; she would worship anyone that gave her any scrap of affection. I could count on her allegiance for when you did come back and started spreading your poison. Although, I have to admit, I wasn't expecting Dean to be such an ally. I was expecting for you to have already turned him against me by then."

"Believe me, I tried." She growled in response, "But then again, that was probably just me starting to remember how horrible you were to us when we were kids. You're lucky you're traumatized us both to the point where we blocked out our childhoods, because if you hadn't, then your little game wouldn't have lasted so long…"

"Game? Pammy, it's very callous of you to refer to me killing so many filthy witches as a game… It was sport." He said sarcastically, chuckling a little.

"Why…?" Pamela breathed, tears streaming down her face as she watched Arc's shadow take flight in front of the window and ignoring his heartless comment, "Why me? Why did you have to kill so many witches just to get to _me_?"

"Because you're evil!" He bellowed, his eyes widening threateningly and breaking his cool exterior, "Your kind are pathetic and disgusting, thinking that having powers makes you better than the rest of us… You tore my family apart with your very presence, being such a poor, damaged puppy that needed more attention than their own son!"

"I wasn't the one who _killed_ them!" She screamed.

He ignored her, continuing to talk, "Although I got to admit, your powers are pretty awesome. And I think, after all these years of killing your fellow rats, I've realized that it's all about the motivation behind the power, and that way, I can justify using your powers to serve justice." He regained his cocky composure, smirking, "Hell, I used one of them just before you got here. What was it called…? Oh, yeah!" His eyes narrowed, somehow destroying all her hope with just a glance, "A premonition!" He boomed, suddenly gesturing at her and causing the gun in her pocket to fly from her grasp into his with her telekinesis. "Now you're screwed…" He chuckled, throwing his hand out again and sending her flying down the massive room telekinetically. She landed heavily on her left arm, unbearable pain suddenly shooting up and down it the moment it cracked against the marble.

The window caved in as Arc made his entrance, his stone face crumpled into an angry grimace as he held two energy balls within his palms. He didn't even get time to use them. Trent rose to the gun to him, shooting him twice just to stun the gargoyle, causing the two projectiles to fizzle out from the interruption before he hit the wall from being blasted back from the barrage of bullets, small chips now appearing in his body where he had been shot. The witch hunter than opened his mouth, releasing a supersonic scream of audiokinetic energy and pummeling Arc with it. The gargoyle was pinned to the wall under the pressure, and he slowly began to shake. Pamela's heart broke when one of his stone legs fell off, plummeting to the floor and disintegrating into white dust. The rest of Arc's limbs followed suit, before he was completely ripped apart, blowing up into a cloud of dust that fell to the marble, leaving nothing left.

"No!" Pamela screamed, trying to push herself up to her feet without her left arm. She had lost someone else. She shouldn't have brought him. It was all her fault.

"That really was stupid…" Trent growled, turning on her and raising her own weapon against her, preparing to shoot.

Panicking, Pamela made a run for it, bolting towards the door just as she heard the wall that she been standing in front of a few seconds ago cave in due to an explosion suddenly detonating and spraying her back with debris, making her ears ring from the noise. He was using her powers against her. She let out a small scream when she heard a gunshot, still continuing to run. She had barely got out of the dining room when the wall to her right suddenly blew up in a shower of wood chips and dust, the force of the explosion throwing her into the room she had been passing. The Walkers' bedroom.

"Kinda fitting that it should end here for you as well, don't you think?" Trent boomed manically as he strode into the room, covered in dust from walking through the aftermath of the destruction he had wrought. Pamela looked up from the floor to face him valiantly, only to be met with his fist as he punched her, knocking her out and leaving her completely defenseless. "After all these years…" A euphoric expression spread across Trent's face, "It's finally going to be over."

He raised the gun, and almost pulled the trigger, before someone suddenly leapt on his back, throwing off his aim and knocking the gun from his hands. The witch hunter growled when he recognized the watch on the arm that was around his neck, "You should have stayed away, Dean!" He shouted jovially, before grabbing hold of his little brother's wrists and throwing him telekinetically over his back, sending him flying into the wall upside down and causing him to smack his head off the floor.

Nevertheless, Dean got up, his lip now bleeding, "Don't you dare touch her, you _bastard_!" He roared, before running at his big brother again, only to get effortlessly tossed through the air once again, this time hitting the floor and rolling the rest of the way until he hit the wall. He went to get up, before Trent suddenly kicked him forcefully in the gut, causing him to hit the ground once again as the older man continued to kick him violently.

"You little son of a bitch!" Trent growled, continuing to kick Dean in the stomach before moving onto his head, slamming his foot into his little brother's face numerous times, "The only thing you've achieved…" Another kick to the face, "Is that…" Again, "You'll die before-,"

Three loud, successive bangs silenced Trent almost immediately. The wall in front of him was sprayed with blood as all the bullets went right through him, stopping in the wall. Blood began to trickle down the side of his mouth, he struggled to turn around and face his killer, seeing Pam barely conscious, holding the gun shakily in her right hand. He tried to speak as she stumbled to her feet, staring at him, completely dumbfounded by her own actions. Just he thought he had found the words, he fell to the floor with a thud and began to choke on his own blood, the crimson liquid rising so far that it spilled out his mouth. He was gone. It was over.

"Dean…?" Pamela called weakly, not even hearing the sirens in the distance as she limped over to her little brother, who was bleeding badly, "Dean?" She called out more strongly as she collapsed to her knees beside him, resting her hand on his arm and gently shaking him, "Please, Dean, please wake up! I can't lose you!" She sobbed, leaning in to his bleeding face to see if he was still breathing, "Dean, I can't lose you too. Wake up! _Wake up!_"

* * *

"… And that's what happened." Pamela said quietly, tears now freely flowing down her face as she finished retelling the story. She let out a sigh and scrunched up her eyes, before using the handkerchief she had used for lip on her eyes, dabbing her cheeks with it in an effort to pull herself together, "I swear, that's all that happened. I don't remember anything else."

"But what about the explosions you said happened? How did Trent manage to rig them together?" Strane asked desperately, frustrated as a lot of this information was useless to the investigation.

"I don't know. You'd have to ask Trent that…" She murmured with a sniff, "Can I please go now? I need to know if my brother is okay."

"We're not done here, Miss Walker!"

The door suddenly flew open, revealing Bridget in the hallway before she stormed in, her eyes wide with rage, "What the hell is going on in here?" She demanded, looking at Detective Strane in shock.

"Who are you?"

"Bridget McAvoy, third year law student at NYU!" She boomed proudly, placing her hand on Pamela's shoulder and glaring down at the police officer, "I'm assuming you know, _detective_, that if a witness is found injured at a crime scene, their health takes precedence over the case. That's simple protocol, and respect to the witness' rights. Miss Walker is clearly injured! Her arm is broken, she has an abundance of open wounds, a black eye, and I wouldn't be surprised if she's cracked a rib." The mutant gently helped Pamela to her feet and put her coat around her shoulders, "This interview is over." She said angrily, "I'm taking my friend to the hospital, and if you bother her or her brother while they're in recovery, I will slap a lawsuit on this entire department so fast, it'll make your head spin! C'mon, Pam!"

Bridget stormed out of the interview room, her face turning completely white as she walked to the elevator like a zombie; Pamela followed her, amazed at the normally quiet girl's sudden display of assertiveness. She had even left Detective Strane speechless, "That was awesome." Pamela breathed as they waited for the elevator to come. Her friend could only stare at the floor in response.

"Dean called me a while ago, but it took me a while to get through the traffic…" Bridget explained, taking a deep breath to process what had just happened, "I've never done anything like that before in my life!" She gasped as the elevator doors opened, stunned at her own anger. "I can't feel my fingers…"

* * *

He looked so still.

The monotonous beep of the heart monitor was the only sound in the room as Pamela, her left arm now in a sling and the scar under her eye in stitches, walked towards her brother, who still hadn't woken up from his life saving operation. She was tempted to stay where she was, as with each step closer, he looked worse. Large, hideous bruises had begun to appear on his face and vicious scars lay on top of them, looking even worse. White bandages had been wrapped around his head and chest was barely rising and falling. This wasn't her brother. It was his shadow.

"Hey…" She breathed quietly, gripping his hand tightly and thankful that it was warm, "… You never told me that you left Gwen here, in labour, to come and save me." She said with a small smile, "… I guess with everything she found out, along with seeing Arc fly and talk made her water break, huh?" The only response she got was the beep, "Anyway… she's resting after her c-section, and you are the father of a beautiful little girl! Although you wouldn't know she got some of her looks from you with your face right now…" She joked, mainly for own benefit, because if she properly faced up to this, she would crack again, and couldn't have that happen. "… Apparently, Gwen told the nurse before she went in for her operation, that if it was a girl, she wanted it to be called Joanna… You never even told me you had decided on that name…" Tears began to flow down her cheeks silently once again, "It's a beautiful choice!" She proclaimed, letting out one choked sob before composing herself with a loud sniff, "Okay… I'm gonna go and deal with one more thing, but I promise I'll come back. I mean, you saved my life. The least I can do is make sure you wake up and live the rest of yours…"

She was reluctant to let go of his hand. She felt like she was abandoning him at a time where he needed her the most. But this had to be dealt with now, if only to completely end this entire nightmare before the sun began to rise.

* * *

Pamela wearily pushed her apartment door open, shuffling in to find McKenzie sitting anxiously on the sofa, her feet apparently now having been tended to, as she was now wearing a pair of Dean's socks and a pair of Pamela's own sneakers. "Oh, thank God!" She exclaimed, shooting to her feet and wincing slightly as she did, "I'm so glad you're okay! Dean left hours ago to take Gwen to the hospital after her water broke. I was going out of my mind with worry before Bridget called and got me up to speed."

The Halliwell witch sighed tiredly as she lay her keys down on the counter, "Are you sure you weren't going out of your mind with guilt?"

McKenzie's face fell, "What are talking about?"

"Do you think I'm stupid?" Pamela asked her sadly, shaking her head, "Trent had your power, which means he must have been frequently injuring you so he could complete taking it. He targeted witches that I was friends with, which is information that only you and Jordann know, and lastly… You escaped!" She raised her voice, "You, reduced to a powerless mortal, managed to escape from a witch hunter with my powers, while Jordann, who kicks seventeen kinds of ass in a fight, was taken and nearly killed!" She stepped forward, "What did he do? Rough you up a bit before telling you to run forty blocks to my apartment without shoes while he attacked Jordann?"

"Pam, I don't know what you're-,"

"Don't lie to me!" She screamed, "After everything I've went through tonight, don't you _dare_ lie to me!"

McKenzie, now on the verge of tears herself, let out a crumpled sob before speaking, "Everything was fine in the first few months… but then he threatened to kill me if I didn't go along with everything he said, and if I tried to tell you, he would kill you too, and I couldn't let that happen. I was trying to protect you!"

"No, you were trying to save your own ass by giving him the names of my friends so he could get under my skin!" Pamela responded angrily. The two of them shared a silence, before she spoke again, "I want you go home, pick up everything you need, and leave town, because if I ever see you again after tonight, I won't be responsible for my actions."

McKenzie looked down at the floor in despair, crying freely now, before she walked slowly towards the door, giving Pamela one last pleading look as she walked past her. "You could have found a way to tell me." The witch said simply as her former friend left, making her stop in her tracks, "And you know what? Even if you had told me yesterday, when my relationship with Trent was at its best, I would have believed you, and I could have helped you… But he's dead now, so you've missed you chance."

"I'm sorry…" McKenzie whispered sadly, before leaving Pamela in the apartment alone. Nothing but silence around her.

Yesterday, she had had everything. Now, all she had was silence.

* * *


	37. Forever

Okay, all you people who have me on author and story alert, don't forget to drop in and send me some reviews about these last few chapters! This one is a long one, so enjoy!

**Forever**

Eden Gareth was a simple woman. She didn't need much in life to make her happy, which was good, as her husband has passed away a few years ago, and her children visited her only on a few rare occasions. She didn't mind though. She loved the quiet, and she hated having to fill it with pointless small talk. Unless it was to her garden, "There you go; my lovelies…" She cooed sweetly as she poured water over a bed of powder blue flowers, before digging her gloved hands into the plump soil beneath and patting it into place softly. Her silver hair, which was tied up in a tight bun, gleamed in the sunlight that was catching the back of her neck, despite the large hat she wore. "I would hate for the sun to completely dry you up."

The elderly woman loved this part of her garden. It was at the very back, surrounded by a thick canopy of trees that had been there for years, with the powerful sunlight pouring through gaps in the leaves. It was such a beautiful secluded spot, and she loved sitting within it on a summer afternoon, reading a trashy romance novel before slowly drifting to sleep in her lounger to the sound of the leaves rustling in the wind. At this stage in her life, it was going through the simple motions of her day that made her happy.

Unfortunately, it was the fact that she was so wrapped up in her plants that made her oblivious to her garden slowly coming in on her. The trees that surrounded the circular concrete patio began to move, looming over as the branches magically extended and crept towards her. The plants behind her suddenly began to sprout into life, blooming into dangerously red flowers as they too extended out of the ground, their stems slithering over the cool stone and making a beeline for the woman in front of them, who had now begun to hum a melodic tune to herself.

Eden was about to move along to the next set of plants, when the powder blue plants she had just been tending to suddenly began to grow at a phenomenal rate, "What the…?" The stems rose up from the ground, elevating the flower heads to her eye level as they danced, swaying gently in the breeze. Before she could reach out to touch them, the flowers suddenly flew at her face, coiling around her neck with steadily increasing pressure. This sudden move was the signal that made the other flowers and branches also join in, wrapping themselves around Eden's neck as her face slowly began to turn red from the lack of oxygen. She fell onto her back, taking any precious gasp at air she could get.

"Paige, throw the potion!"

The witchlighter complied with Piper's wishes and threw the vial down to the ground. It smashed instantly, a hazy cloud of rusty brown mist spreading out through the area. An unnatural wail of agony pierced the air as the flowers recoiled from the woman's neck, slowly losing their colour as they retreated from their target before completely drying up and disintegrating on the concrete. The branches followed suit shortly after, withering within seconds and showering them all with dead leaves as they began to fall from the dead tree.

"Okay, I'll take her back to the Manor then I'll come back for you. Be careful…" Paige warned, kneeling down next to their shell shocked innocent and vanishing with her in a swirl of white and blue orbs.

"It's just you and me now!" Piper called out to the dead foliage around her, smirking. Tiny twinkles of orange light began to pour from the various dried up plants as the witch held out her hands, as if she was sucking the life out of them with her geokinetic abilities. She watched as all the streams of orange light coalesced in front of her, forming a swirling, twisting mass of energy that struggled against Piper's grasp.

She lowered one hand into her pocket, fishing out the vanquishing spell while she focused all her power into one hand, "She blossoms through the seeds of life, causing death and fear and strife, take her now unto the earth, and-Hey!" She let out a shriek as she felt something wrap around her ankle, seeing a flower that must have managed to avoid the potion's effect. Piper frowned darkly, gesturing down at the plant and reducing it to a pile of dust with her own powers. She looked up to finish the spell, only to find out that her target had fled during her distraction.

"Did you get her?" Paige asked excitedly as she materialized, looking around the garden and scanning for the creature they had come to deal with.

"No!" Piper snapped, shaking her leg and getting the rest of the dust from the creases in her jeans, "Next time, we're killing the whole garden!"

* * *

"Yeah… okay…" Brennan spoke into the phone pressed against his ear, staring forward with his eyes glazed over as the person on the other end of the line continued to speak to him, "I can't give you an answer right now, but I'll definitely think about it… Yeah, I'm going to talk to Phoebe about it too… Alright; I'll talk to you later, bye." He hung up the phone, placing it down on the coffee table and let out the breath he had been holding for most of the conversation.

He heard the front door open suddenly, giving entrance to Phoebe as she walked into the house, her eyes down, looking at the screen of her blackberry and not even seeing that her husband was in the house until she noticed something out the corner of her eye, "Oh!" She jumped, her eyes widening behind her glasses, "Sorry, I didn't see you there. Aren't you supposed to be at work?"

"Yeah, but I got a cancellation. The husband of the woman who called in said that he couldn't hear the noise the car was making and he wasn't going to pay good money just to hear someone tell him what he already knew." He explained, smirking when he saw Phoebe's face go red as they had had a similar situation a few months ago, "And my next client isn't coming in until two so I've got a few hours to kill. What are you doing here?"

"Oh, I just came home to pick up some notes for work." She looked down at her blackberry again, inspecting the small clock in the corner of the screen, "… But I guess I can take an hour or two out. Wanna have an early lunch or something? I'm pretty sure there's still some of that lasagna left over from last night…" She mused, dropping her purse onto the couch and walking into the kitchen.

"Okay, sure." Brennan got up, following her slowly as he tried to piece his words together, "Actually, this works out perfectly. I wanna talk to you about something, and it's probably better that the kids aren't around to interrupt."

"Oh?" Phoebe didn't turn around as he entered the kitchen, instead delved her head into the fridge and pulling out a casserole dish that had silver foil over it. The witch promptly removed the foil and placed the dish into the oven, only turning to her husband once she had put the lasagna under a low heat to make it edible once again, "Alright then, what is it you want to talk about?" Her face fell, "This isn't something totally life shattering, is it? Because leftover lasagna isn't good during a crisis."

Brennan chuckled softly, leaning against the doorframe, "No, don't worry. It's nothing like that…" He assured her, stepping into the kitchen and placing his hands on the counter, "Uh… Well, I got a call from Allison just there. She told me that she and Sandra are moving out of the house, and… they offered it to us." Phoebe immediately stopped in her task of getting glasses from the cupboard, "Yeah, apparently, they don't want to live with all the memories anymore, and they're going to sell it if we don't take it. It was left to all four of us, and Nelle doesn't want it, so that just leaves us… and you're frozen, and that's never good."

"No! I'm fine, sorry!" Phoebe stammered, shaking herself out of the trance she had fell into after hearing this news, "Um…" She scratched her head, breathing deeply, "This would mean that we'd be moving, right? Out of the city, out of the state? Away?"

"That's what moving across country usually entails, yes." Brennan responded sarcastically, before going back sitting silently, not wanting to disturb her as she thought the proposition over, "So… does that mean that you don't want to do it then? You couldn't be away from your sisters?"

"No, that's not the problem." Phoebe replied immediately, before rethinking her statement. "…Okay, its part of the problem, but not a big part. I mean, I moved away from them before and that turned out for the best, and maybe this would too. It's just… My job has got really hectic lately, and I don't think I could do the long distance thing again. Not to mention we've now got Connor into school and he would have to leave all his friends… and his cousins!" Her heart was crushed when he looked at that floor, clearly upset that she shooting down the idea, "And now you think that I'm looking for excuses…" She sighed, "But I'm not, I'm really not, because this is really tempting, and it would be the perfect place to raise our kids, but-," She sudden stopped herself mid sentence and shoved her hand into her back pocket, pulling out her vibrating cellphone and flipping it open to read the message she had received, "It's a 911 message from Piper…"

"Go." Brennan said tiredly, waving lazily towards the door with a sigh, avoiding her gaze.

"We'll talk when I get back, I promise." Phoebe said quietly, striding towards the kitchen door, sweeping her hand over his shoulder lovingly as she passed and stuffing her cellphone back into her pocket. She was ready to walk out of the house, when she stopped to pick up her purse, grabbing it over the back of the sofa and making sure she had everything.

"Is it always going to be like this?"

Silence fell upon them as Phoebe stopped rummaging in her purse. She looked up and out of the front window, seeing some of Connor's toys splayed across the lawn from the day before. It had been beautiful until they had been attacked in the front yard by the demonic spirit her sisters were currently tracking. The witch rolled her eyes sadly and swung her purse onto her shoulder, "God, I hope not."

* * *

"I… I don't understand." Eden breathed as she lowered herself into one of the attic's more comfortable sofas. Her face had nearly gone the same colour as her hair from the fear at what she had experienced, her neck an angry red and bleeding in small places where rose thorns had sliced her. "What happened? Who are you people… and what did you do to my garden?" She asked, regaining some strength to her voice as she remembered seeing all the plants and trees she had nurtured for years being destroyed in an instant.

"Well, to be fair, your garden started it." Piper deadpanned, handing their innocent a glass of water, "And what did we do? Well… it was a potion. Originally, it's supposed to kill all living things that its smoke comes into contact with, but my sister, the potions whiz…" She gestured to Paige, who smiled nervously next to her, "… altered the recipe so it would only kill plant life, so we wouldn't kill you as well."

"But why?" She breathed, looking at the two women standing over her. Fear flashed in her eyes for a brief moment, "What are you? Why are you talking about potions… and how did I even _get_ here?" She shrieked, pressing her hands down on the sofa as if she making sure it was real.

"Short version?" Paige chipped in with a raised eyebrow, "We're witches, and we saved you from a demon called-,"

"Well, a demonic spirit, technically." Piper interrupted.

"Whatever." The witchlighter snapped back, "Anyway, we saved you from a demonic spirit called Terra, who can possess any kind of life that grows from the ground and use it to kill innocent people. She made the mistake of coming after my other sister's family yesterday and now we're after her. We tracked her down to your house, and… well, you pretty much lived the rest."

"W-witches?" Eden stammered, looking down at the ground with a wide eyed stare, "The dementia finally got to me, didn't it? You're actually hospital nurses and are just indulging the hallucination that my garden tried to choke me… Yes, that must be it." She suddenly stood to her full height, shocking Piper when the feeble old woman was actually taller than her. "I need to leave now, excuse me."

"Hold it!" The eldest Charmed One laid her hand on Eden's arm, causing her to turn around, "Look, lady, you may want to deny what just happened to you, but the redness on your neck sure doesn't." At this, Eden rearranged the light scarf around her neck and used it to cover the crimson skin and small welts, "Whether you believe us or not, you're still in danger. Terra's going to keep coming after you until you're dead and you won't stand a chance without us."

Seeing that their innocent was still hesitant, and Piper was a few seconds away from having to freeze her, Paige slowly raised her hand up to Eden's neck, "Here…" A golden glow burst forth from the witch's hand, making the old woman flinch in shock before basking in the warm, healing glow she was under, "As witches, we not only protect, we heal as well," She took her hand away, leaving Eden's neck completely healed to her amazement.

"Am I really going to safe here?" She asked timidly, her eyes darting around the attic to see if there was any plant life that could potentially try and kill her.

"Yes. We put crystals outside-," Paige was cut off when Piper elbowed her in the side, clearly wanting her little sister to stay away from explaining the mechanics of witchcraft, "We've protected the house. And it'll hold until we've vanquished Terra, I promise." She beamed, prompting her elder sibling to do the same and scare their innocent slightly as a result.

"Alright…" Eden said unsurely, slowly sitting back down and placing her clasped hands on her lap, as if she was waiting for the train.

"Alright!" Piper echoed, giving Eden another disconcerting smile before looping her arm with Paige's and walking towards the Book of Shadows, the grin still plastered on her face, "Next time, try not to petrify the innocent by talking about crystals and stuff like that, will you?

"Coming from the woman who thought it was appropriate to make sure the innocent knew exactly which kind of homicidal _evil_ was after her!" Paige hissed back, before they both turned at the sound of shoes on the wooden steps that led up to the attic as Phoebe entered slowly, staring straight ahead as if she wasn't even in her own body. "Ah! Eden, this is the acclaimed other sister I was telling you about. This is Phoebe." She said with comical pride, putting an arm around the middle Charmed One as she walked over to her and snapping Phoebe out of the trance she seemed to be in.

"Hey…" Phoebe replied distantly, "What's this all about?

Eden smirked approvingly, "Well, at least you're not as peppy as the other two. I'm…" She trailed off when she saw three columns of light descend through the ceiling and began to take form behind Piper, who had her arms laid over the Book of Shadows. The front pillar was made up of white and light blue glowing orbs, while the two behind it where a darker, royal blue. Shaking, Eden raised her hand and pointed at the source of light, her mouth having open in shock, "L-look over there!" The three witches turned around and look as the columns of light took the shape of people, not even flinching after seeing hundreds of beings orb into their presence.

"We have a huge problem!" Leo breathed as he materialized; speaking so quickly that the orbs around him hadn't even properly vanished

"This is Leo, my husband. He's also the king of tact." Piper said sarcastically, before looking past the Elder and frowning suspiciously, "These two, however, I've never seen in my entire life.

A man and woman stood behind Leo, looking forward with hard stares, as if they weren't even addressing the fact that there were other people in the room besides themselves. Just looking at them made Piper feel inferior. It was as if they made in the image of the perfect human

The tall man's straw blonde hair and strong jaw framed his face perfectly, with striking blue eyes that seemed to pierce your body and look into your soul as its purest form. There was not a scar or blemish on his slightly bronzed skin, and Piper imagined that it he were to show something that remotely resembled a smile, his teeth would probably be perfect, and his grin would make her weak at the knees

The woman was practically the same. Long, gorgeous strawberry blonde hair flowed perfectly down her back, not one strand out of the place. Her beautiful, slender face looked like it was made of porcelain, and looked to be just as smooth. Warm brown eyes were the focal point of her face, making her look like an angel. She held herself with the utmost elegance at all times, and Piper could tell this just from seeing her for three seconds

"Um… Leo, who are your new friends?"

"This is Adam." Leo replied, gesturing to the taller man behind him, who nodded respectfully to the four woman in the room, before Leo turned to the other side and gestured to the woman, "And this is Eve.

"Adam and Eve? Are you kidding?" Phoebe scoffed, laying her purse down on the table and staring at Eve's face, amazed at how flawless her complexion was

"No," Leo replied with an amused tone, before going back to the business at hand, "And seeing as how these two were the first whitelighters in existence, the names are kinda appropriate, don't you think?

"So, we have Adam, Eve, and Eden?" Paige asked with a raised eyebrow, grinning wildly, "Wow, it's a bible hat-trick!"

* * *

"Okay, I put a few crystals around Eden, so she'll be safe until we get back up to the attic." Piper announced as she entered the living room, joining her bemused sisters on the largest sofa and swinging her legs onto the cushions as she sat on the armrest, looking over to the three angelic beings across from her. "Okay, I know I'm not an expert on the first two whitelighters in existence, but I'm guessing if you're giving as a personal visit, it's not good. What's going on?

Leo looked to the two whitelighters that he had arrived with, "I think I'll let you guys explain." He then turned to his wife and sisters in law, "I was just asked to bring them to you, I have no idea what's going on.

Adam and Eve exchanged a look, before the latter of the two spoke, "We're here because the realm of death was breached by two beings that you have grown familiar with over the last two years. The agents of the Hollow, Diam and Tyola. They somehow broke down magic that has been in existence since the dawn of time, and were able to enter the afterlife with their physical forms still intact. They destroyed us several times with your powers…" She added, looking at Piper and causing the witch to cast her eyes down to the floor, "And eventually, after the amount of injuries we sustained, it took us too long to reform and they got past us."

"Why are they even in the afterlife to begin with?" Paige asked, narrowing her eyes, "I mean, it would certainly make our lives a lot simpler if they stayed there."

"To get the artifact that we were charged with protecting." Adam interjected, taking over for his partner. "You sending the Devil's Eye to a place where they couldn't reach it intensified their desperation to release their master. I'm sure that if you hadn't done that, they wouldn't be going to such lengths to get the Angelus Barba, known better as the Angel's Whisper in these times…"

"Wait a minute," Phoebe interrupted, putting her hand up, "I… remember reading about that in the Book of Shadows. That's the other half of the seal that keeps the Hollow locked in its box, isn't it? Then why the hell are you wasting time here instead of protecting something like that?"

Both whitelighters took offence at this remark, and visibly hardened, "We took precautions before coming. As we speak, spirits that we enlisted to hold the two of them off will be fighting them, and immediately recovering from any injuries as spirits are eternal. Second of all, it cannot be destroyed. The Angel's Whisper is also eternal. It thrives off the hopes and dreams of every good being in this universe. They would have to destroy the very concept of hope if they wanted to destroy it."

"But you don't know them like we do, all due respect." Paige responded calmly, her hands clasped around one of her knees, "All you've done is sense shifts in powers, never experiencing anything first hand, but Diam and Tyola are tricky, and they wouldn't have gone after the Angel's Whisper if they didn't have some sort of plan, especially given the risk of going into the afterlife."

"That's why we came for you," Eve answered, her expression remaining like stone, "You have experience dealing with these beings, and you're the best equipped to fight them. Besides, we lost our jurisdiction the moment they got past us. What they've done has become a pivotal event, and we can no longer interfere in the actions of this world. It's the price we pay for existing outside time and space."

The three sisters shared uneasy glances between one another, before both Phoebe and Paige folded and cast their gaze to the floor, leaving their big sister to make the decision for them, "Okay, so how to get into the afterlife then?" She droned with a roll of her eyes, before jumping at the sound of a familiar voice behind her.

"That's where I come in."

The Charmed Ones turned around and each reacted in their own way to the appearance of the Angel of Death. The eternal being gave them one of his trademark smirks, always taking pleasure in sneaking up on his victims. "So…" He began, folding his arms and chuckling lowly, "After all these years of me playing on your field, you're coming to play on mine. This should be very interesting indeed…" He stalked into the living room from the foyer, his footsteps not even making a sound as he walked. "Are you ready?"

"Wait a minute, if Death is taking us there, doesn't that mean-?"

Adam cut Phoebe off sharply before she could finish her question, "Technically speaking, your bodies will still be alive, just lacking your spirits, although there's only so long one's body can last without the will to live behind every breath, so we must be swift in every action we take." He locked eyes with Death, nodding gravely, "Do it."

"No! Wait! What about our innocent? We can't just leave her high and dry!" Piper protested, glaring suspiciously at Death as he lowered the arm that he raised on Adam's command.

"Uh… I'll call Pam, and get her to help out for the time being." Leo replied uncertainly, biting his lip.

"Are you kidding me? After all that girl's been through over the last three weeks?"

"This cannot wait." Eve interjected firmly.

Piper heaved a conflicted sigh, rubbing her head in thought for a moment before resigning herself to the inevitable, "Alright… But keep an eye on her, and get the other guys here so she doesn't have to do much. I really don't think she's up to it."

"Then it's settled…" Death said darkly, swiping his hand through the air in the Charmed Ones' general direction, a white glow shimmering across his palm's path as all three witches suddenly fell unconscious. Phoebe and Paige fell back onto the sofa, while Piper, still perched on the armrest, began to fall backwards before luckily being caught by Leo just before she tumbled to the ground. "Sorry for your loss." He said, black humour dripping in his voice as he vanished in a swirl of ghostly blue smoke, the façade of a skeleton briefly flashing within before it completely dissipated. Adam and Eve then vanished in two columns of dark blue orbs that shot swiftly through the ceiling, leaving Leo alone with nothing but his dead wife in his arms.

* * *

"Well, this certainly isn't what I was expecting…"

A dim golden hue coming from beneath them illuminated the Charmed Ones' faces. The platform they stood on glowed and sparkled, but for some reason, it was anything but comforting. It was as if they were in a hole, as Piper could clearly see the walls of the circular area. They looked earthly and dirty, but also reeked of ancient magic so strongly that it was assaulting all their senses to the point where her eyes watered. They also weren't at the bottom of wherever they had landed. As Piper looked down, she could see that a path, beginning from the platform they were standing on, coiled downwards with smaller platforms breaking up the path now and again before it descended into what seemed to be a pit of swarming black orbs that clouded whatever lay beneath. Whatever the reason they were here, all three witches silently pleaded with the Gods that said reason wouldn't lead them downwards.

However, despite the harsh contrast to below, what lay above them wasn't that inviting either. The sight of millions and millions of orbs swarming high above them and concealing the end of the path that trailed upwards was just as comforting as the rest of place. It really did come down to mystery in the end, even when someone had come this far, they still wouldn't know what fate had in store for them. Not all the orbs, however, where above and beneath them. There were many that hovered gloomily around the walls at all heights. A dark red orb flew by Phoebe's face, startling her briefly before she realized that en entire slew of orbs, all the same colour, where hovering around her like insects. She let out a squeal and flapped her arms, causing the orbs to scatter and vanish into the mass that flew around the walls. "What the hell is going on here?" Phoebe asked loudly, surprised when she heard no echo after she spoke, only the sounds of faint wailing every time an orb went by her.

"They're lost souls." Adam replied sorrowfully, holding out his hand and letting a cluster of different coloured orbs float into his palm, "Many don't have the courage to cross over, and some simply refuse to accept their fate. They spend the rest of eternity here, never achieving the peace that every being deserves after life." He blew gently on his hand, causing the orbs to scatter and fly away. "Every orb is actually a spirit, so when a whitelighter summons their power to orb, they are, in essence, calling on the spirits for help in getting to where they need to be."

"That's kinda creep-!" Paige was cut off when a train of lilac orbs suddenly passed right through her stomach, causing her to take a deep breath from the odd sensation before she watched the trail vanish, "Okay, why do they keep doing that? What's their big interest in us?" She asked, flinching slightly when Piper aggressively swatted at an orb in front of her face.

"Fresh meat." Death replied stonily, walking in front of them smoothly and nearly blending into the darkness. "They have never seen another spirit in a human façade, other than those two and me, of course." He said, gesturing to Adam and Eve. "They are just curious as to what makes you so special that you deserve a full escort."

"Speaking of which…" Eve interrupted, her eyes narrowed at Death, "You can't go any further now. You have a job to do; they're in _his_ hands now."

"Oh, yes," Death responded smoothly, "I'm almost disappointed that I'm going to miss this, actually. It's sure to be hilarious…" He drawled, smirking at Phoebe for a brief moment before fading away within a coil of glowing blue smoke.

"Wait, what did he mean by that?" Phoebe asked, immediately on alert after Death's comment as she turned around to berate two original whitelighters behind her, not seeing her sisters' shocked faces at whatever was in front of them.

"I think he meant me."

Phoebe spun around at the voice, her eyes going wide with a mixture of confusion, surprise, and fear. She backed up, reaching for Piper's hand and not stopping until she felt the gentle squeeze of her big sisters digits around her palm. It couldn't be the person she thought she was seeing; it had to just be someone with a striking resemblance. There was absolutely no way, she had sent him on to the afterlife herself with her own power.

Cole stood before them, clad in a black robe that dusted the ground and covered his neck, similar to how Death looked. He hadn't aged a day in nine years, it seemed, looking considerably younger than the three women that stood agape at him. A nervous smile crossed his lips as he fidgeted with his hands, not sure how to deal with the Charmed Ones' reactions. He let out a sigh, before settling on the broad grin that, in another time, would have sent Phoebe straight into his arms, "Surprise! …I guess."

* * *

"No."

Leo frowned as his niece, heaving a large sigh and trying to push the vanquishing spell into Pamela's hand once again only to have her ball her hand into a fist so she couldn't take hold of it, "Pam!" Leo suddenly exclaimed in a raised voice, losing his temper slightly as his hands briefly went to his head, before he controlled himself, "Look, I know that you've been through absolute hell recently, and that protecting an innocent is the last thing you want to do, but-,"

"No, you're wrong; it's not the last thing I want to do, it doesn't even _get_ on the list of things I want to do. I don't want to do it at _all_." Pamela responded strongly, standing up from her perch on the armrest of the chair in the living room and getting in her uncle's face. She looked absolutely terrible. Her hair glimmered in natural light, looking greasy due to her inability to wash her hair properly with only one working arm. The colour and life had vanished from her face, leaving it covered in sickly yellow bruises and small crimson cuts from where wreckage from exploding walls had sliced her. The large scar that tore through her face, which was normally covered by the witch's natural colour and attractive eyes, was now the main feature of her face. Combining all her injuries with the broken arm that currently hung in the sling suspended around her neck, and she looked like she had been put in a blender and barely got out alive, "You're a powerful witch." She growled, glaring at Brennan who was sitting on the sofa, watching what was happening in silent pity, "Why can't you do this instead of me?"

"Because we don't know if my power's enough to do it." He responded calmly, "With you, we know for sure that you have enough power."

"Well, even if you can't vanquish Terra, you can certainly force her to retreat if you say the spell," She snatched the piece of paper from Leo's hands and gave it to Brennan, dropping down onto the sofa next to him and giving him a saccharine smile, "That way, you still save the innocent, and if you can't vanquish her, then you call me for something legitimate. Not…" She glared at Leo, "For something that may not even require my powers." She smacked Brennan a few times on the knee with her free hand before rising, "Good luck!"

"Pam, a woman's life in danger!" Leo protested.

"She's sixty nine! Her life is in perpetual danger at that age!" She shouted back, before a torrent of water suddenly flew up from the floor and quickly took the form of Aidan, was currently toweling his hair dry and wearing his work clothes in the form of a simple white t-shirt and navy blue tracksuit bottoms, "Did you get pulled away from something too?" Pamela asked him sarcastically as he threw the towel onto the chair.

"Nope, I don't have to go into work for a few hours since I work the swing shift now, which basically means I haven't seen my family awake in weeks." He replied bitterly, loathing his four in the afternoon to midnight work hours, "I actually just woke up an hour ago, hence the post-shower wet hair." The elemental commented, before turning to the other two males, "Okay, so what is this about a demonic spirit and my wife being _dead_?"

"I put the girls in the other room." Leo said to him, nodding his head in the direction of the conservatory, where the Charmed Ones' bodies lay unconscious, "They had to go and deal with Hollow stuff, so they should hopefully be back soon. Don't worry; they're completely safe, just unconscious." He said calmly, before turning back to the situation at hand, "Okay, so we have to protect the innocent until the girls get back. Pam, you're not going anywhere, we need you to say the spell in case Terra gets in, and that's final."

"What am I, eight?" She snorted.

"Right now, you're acting like it." Leo shot back with a hint of frustration in his voice, causing his niece to fold and settle, falling back against the archway of the living room, shaking her head.

"Well, if we are going to be serious about protecting her…" Pamela began quietly, accepting the inevitable, "We need to make the barrier stronger. Crystal cages aren't suitable for large scale areas like houses. The bigger the area they have to protect, the less power the barrier has. One of you should go out and switch all the crystals with dark matter."

"I'll do it. I could use some air that isn't filled with smoke for a change." Aidan said darkly, turning on his heel and heading towards the stairs with laboured steps. It was clear that he didn't want to be here either, but he was better at hiding it.

"I'll come upstairs with you, the last thing we should do is spook the innocent with more strangers…" Leo said ruefully, quickly catching up to the elemental before he completely vanished up the steps.

Their departure left Pamela and Brennan alone and in silence, not even registering each other's existence until Brennan spoke up, his tone full of sympathy and pity, "I heard what happened." He said softly, "How are you holding up?"

"Fine." She replied flatly, "Although I may just crack if someone asks me that question one more time…"

"Well, if you need to talk about it, I can lend an ear." The mutant, standing up to his full height and shoving his hands into his back pockets, "I mean, I'm probably the only one out of everyone in your life who has a remote idea of what you're going through, so…"

"Yeah, right." Pamela snorted sarcastically with a roll of her eyes, "Did you kill your brother as well?"

"Yes, actually I did." Brennan replied stonily, all amusement from her vanishing immediately at this proclamation and being replaced by mild shock, "He was going to kill Phoebe, and I wasn't about to stand by and let him kill an innocent person that I loved. So… I blasted him with all the voltage I had and killed him. I like to think that me doing that saved a lot of people who would have died at his hands if he hadn't died at mine."

"Is that what gets you past the crippling guilt?" Pamela asked weakly, staring at him harshly, "Because that's the thing I'm having trouble with. I haven't had a good night's sleep ever since, because I see his lifeless eyes every time I close _my_ eyes. Add that to my newborn niece constantly wanting to give her lungs a work out and I'm pretty much at the end of my rope here."

"It gets better." Brennan replied heavily, knowing that his words weren't that much consolation.

"You promise?" She responded with a wry smirk.

"I promise."

* * *

"You… are like a cockroach!" Paige exclaimed, catching up to Cole as the group slowly made their way up the path, towards the massive cloud of white light above them. Unfortunately for her, the whitelighter couldn't keep up with her prey's larger strides and couldn't get out what she wanted to say properly, "Every time we think you're dead, you're not! You're just skulking around somewhere else. What are you even _doing_ here anyway? Being Death's bitch?"

"Yeah, I'd kinda like to know why as well." Piper added, not noticing that Phoebe hadn't stopped and was continuing to climb.

"I knew there was an advantage to being dead…" Cole muttered ruefully, glad that he couldn't get headaches anymore, before turning around to face the witches who were following him up the path, "And I'm here because… Well, I'll just let those two explain." He said, gesturing to Adam and Eve who were at the end of their trail, making sure no danger came to them.

"He's a spiritual anomaly." Eve responded, folding her arms as it seemed they were taking a break from climbing, "When he died, there was no place for him. While harbouring demonic powers all his life and killing mercilessly as a demon, his soul, somehow was pure, and had merely been corrupted by his powers. We couldn't punish his soul eternally when it was technically innocent, but we couldn't reward him either, as he had killed in cold blood, regardless of the corruption of his soul. So, the compromise was this. Our very own Charon…"

"Charon?" Paige questioned.

"In Greek mythology, Charon guided souls across the River Styx, and into the afterlife." Adam replied, looking over to Cole, "This is what he has become. He guides spirits to where they need to be if they can't accept their fate immediately. He is the final face they see before departing from life completely."

"Poor spirits." Paige quipped, giving Cole a dirty look.

"Paige…" Piper said in her classic scolding tone, "Okay, can we please follow Phoebe's example and keep moving, please? Being in the realm of death is kinda freaking me out." She said, ending the conversation as she turned around and resumed their climb, Adam and Eve following behind her effortlessly. They had made this trek millions of times over their thousands of years of existence.

Cole was about to turn and follow them, when he saw that Paige was still glaring at him. With a roll of his eyes, he smirked devilishly, knowing how to get under her skin. "Oh, give it a rest, Paige. At your age, you're gonna get even more wrinkles if you frown disapprovingly. Not to mention the crow's feet from glaring like that."

Paige's face instantly softened at this as Cole walked away, chuckling to himself, "I'm only thirty-four!"

After their brief break, the group reformed, walking silently as if they were part of a funeral march. The only thing that would break the quiet would be when a profanity would echo from Piper's mouth as she swatted another orb away from her face, and the hushed murmurs of Adam and Eve as they conversed while they walked, discussing something to great importance that they didn't want anyone to hear about. They seemed to be miles away from the top at this point, and even further from the bottom. The pit of black orbs couldn't even be seen anymore. It had been devoured by the shadows from being so high up.

It was at a particularly uneven part of the path were Phoebe tripped and lost her balance, accidentally dancing very close to the edge. She was about to tumble completely when she suddenly let out a yelp as a cold hand wrapped tightly around her flailing arm and pulled her to the middle of the pathway, into a body of similar temperature.

"You should be more careful. It's a long way down and landing is far from pleasant."

The witch looked up at her saviour's face and instantly pulled away from Cole's body, "Thanks." She mumbled, noticing the frightened faces of her sisters up ahead and smiling warmly to them, "It's okay, I'm fine. I just tripped."

Piper rolled her eyes, returning the warm smile, "Klutz." She jibed affectionately before they resumed walking.

"So, what made you walk ahead back there?" Cole asked, catching up to Phoebe before she could speed away, and matching her pace.

"Believe or not, Cole, I don't really care why you got a third lease on life. If you can even call it that…" She responded icily, not even giving him eye contact as she concentrated even more on walking safely, not wanting to repeat what had happened a few seconds ago, "I actually have far bigger things on my mind right now than wondering why you've joined the ranks of the neutral undead."

"Oh yeah, I heard when I was watching over you this morning." He said casually, breaking Phoebe's hard stare on the path ahead of her and making her head spin round to him, "Personally, I don't think you should let the mutant guilt trip you into moving away if that's not what you want to do. His name's… Brendan, right?"

"Brennan." Phoebe corrected him with a glare, "And it has nothing to do with the fact that I would be moving. I would move in a heartbeat if I was sure that…" She trailed off, her face going beet red, "Let's just keep walking. I don't even know why I'm talking about this with you. Piper doesn't even know yet."

"You're talking about it with me because apart from Brandon-,"

"It's Brennan…"

"-I'm probably the only person in the world that knows how you think." Cole said with a triumphant smile, "And you don't think with your head, you think with your heart. Which means it must be about the person you'd be moving with, and not the moving itself. I'm right, aren't I?" He received no answer, but grinned when he saw Phoebe's lip twitch in annoyance over him figuring her out so easily, "I don't blame you though, after the amount of fighting you and Ben-,"

"It's Brennan!"

"-Have been doing over the last few years, it's no surprise that you're not sure if you want to be with him anymore."

"It's not as grave as that, you sadist." Phoebe responded in an annoyed tone, "It's just… After everything that's happened, I'm just wondering whether or not if the only reason mine and Brennan's destinies met was so that we could give each other children, but not be together in the long run…" She suddenly shook her head, letting out an angry noise and making Cole frown in confusion. "Oh my God! Why am I _still_ talking about this with you? The last thing I need is you coming back from the dead because you think you have a chance!" She spat, annoyed at herself before she quickened her pace and walked away from Cole.

"Phoebe?"

"What?"

"You're very welcome."

* * *

Pamela gently tapped her fingernails against the midnight blue cover of the Book of Shadows, letting out a sigh from her pouting mouth. She leaned back on the stool she was sitting on and closed her eyes, enjoying the silence of the Manor. If she had been in a normal state of mind, she would have found the quiet in the normally bustling house to be unsettling, but right now, she relished it. The witch brought her head back, sharing a small smile with their nervous innocent before she opened the book and began to flick through it, "It's the arm, isn't it?"

Eden blinked a few times, coming out of the daydream she had been having, "Excuse me?"

"If I only had a few cuts and a big scar that run through my face, you'd be thinking, 'Boy, I'm in safe hands with that tough chick!' But with the broken arm, you're thinking twice." She looked up, smiling sadly, "It's okay, trust me. Out of all the stares I've got recently, yours the probably the least offensive."

"If you don't mind me asking… what happened to you?" Eden bowed her head when she saw the young lady shift uncomfortably, "I'm sorry if I'm intruding or anything, but I could use a conversation given everything that's happened today."

Pamela let out a quiet, hallow, laugh at this before speaking, "I… made a few errors in judgement. I let my feelings cloud my common sense and trusted someone I shouldn't have, and because of that, people are dead… I almost became one of them, if you can't tell." She said, lazily gesturing to her injured face. The witch decided that it would be best if she left out the part about her killing someone, as she didn't want to scare Eden any further than she already was.

"Well, I can't say I completely understand your situation, but I have made a few errors in judgement in my time." The innocent replied wisely, smiling slightly, "Oh yes, there are a lot of regrets that I wish I could do over… But I've learned that you shouldn't obsess over something you have no control over."

"But I did have control over what happened, I just wasn't aware that I had to use it." Pamela pointed out.

"No, you're not looking hard enough, sweetie." Eden replied with a cocked eyebrow and her eyes sparkling with zest, "You trusted someone you shouldn't have trusted, meaning that this person earned your trust. He tricked it from your hands… I'm assuming it's a he, am I right?" After a brisk nod from Pamela, she continued, "The only thing you're guilty of is being too good a person."

Pamela narrowed her eyes, smirking a little, "Isn't that just a big rationalization?"

Eden shrugged, mimicking the witch's smirk, "Maybe, but listen to whatever gets you past the darkness. That's what I always told my kids when they younger. As long as what got them out of the darkness wasn't drugs, I was fine."

Pamela smiled slightly, before looking down at her watch and shaking her head angrily, "Leo said he would be back by now…" She muttered irritably. Leo had vanished an hour ago as he had been called away to get the Elders up to speed on as to why Adam and Eve had requested the Charmed Ones' counsel. "I can't believe they all bailed out to go to work!" She added, still seething from when Brennan and Aidan had unceremoniously dumped the task of protecting the innocent on her as they had to go to work.

"That's men for you…" Eden said, clicking her tongue and shrugging once again, "What are you gonna do?"

The two of them shared a small laugh, before the window that faced the house next door suddenly exploded in a shower of tiny glass shards, causing both women to turn away from the blast, not seeing the giant surge of vines slithering in through the broken pane and make a beeline for the elderly woman sitting closest to the window. They began to rise up from the floor as Eden turned around, her eyes widening in fear as the vines suddenly shot towards her body, coiling around her and enveloping her entire body almost instantly.

Pamela moved to her aid, but was only able to take one step before a burst of vines branched out from the main vein and threw themselves into her chest, throwing her back into a nearby dresser, smashing it and falling under the numerous shelves that came loose from the impact. Ignoring the searing pain in her broken arm, she spotted the plant vanquishing potion on the table next to her and threw her healthy arm out at it before thrusting it forward to the tangle of vines that had consumed Eden. The potion flew from the table with the help of Pamela's telekinesis, smashing against the wooden floor and immediately causing a wail of agony to rise from the spirit within the plants as the vines slowly turned to dust, dropping Eden to the floor, her skin now a pale blue from the lack of oxygen.

Struggling to her feet, the witch grabbed the spell that had been left on the altar of the Book of Shadows and immediately began to cast it as an orange glow rose up from the dead plant, "She blossoms through the seeds of life, causing death and fear and strife, take her now unto the earth, and salt the ground where she shall burn!" Ignoring the spirit now imploding in the attic, Pamela rushed to the downed innocent, dropping to her knees as Terra vanished in a shower of golden sparks that fizzled out on the floor, "Leo!" She bellowed.

Almost instantly, the Elder appeared in a swathe of orbs right next to her, his normally calm eyes widening when he saw what was before him. He too dropped to his knees, putting his hands over Eden and administering his healing powers, "What happened?" He asked manically.

"That goddamn ivy plant thing that trails up the side of the house, that's what! It must have been within the perimeter of the crystals!" Pamela shouted back, bearing her teeth while do so and giving a heated glance to the dusty remains of the plant that had burst through the window, "Oh; and you left me _alone_ with the innocent as well!" She frowned when Leo pulled his hands away, his face having defeat written all over it. Instantly, her eyes blazed with fury, "What are you doing? You can't just let her die!"

"It's too late… I can't do-,"

"No! I can't let another person die!"

"Pam, I under-!"

"No, you don't!" Pamela bellowed, cutting him off as she rose to her feet and stomped over to the Book of Shadows, spinning the top of the altar around and beginning to flip through the tome at a maddening pace until she found what she was looking for. "It's not over yet…" She murmured to herself, ripping the desired page out of the book and storming towards the attic door.

"Pam, where are you going?" Leo shouted after her, not sure to be worried at his niece's current mental state, or to be angry that she had just defaced an ancient tome of powerful magic.

"To save your damn innocent!" She spat angrily, before disappearing down the stairs and once again, leaving Leo with nothing but a dead body.

* * *

Nothing could compare to this.

Phoebe looked down beneath the floating platform that they were now standing on, vibrant flowers brushing her ankles as the din of waterfalls crashing into a sea of mist below nearly deafened her. All the waterfalls made up one giant u-shaped waterfall, and in the distance, Phoebe could see that all the liquid was being channeled into a sparkling river that twisted and turned all the way to the horizon. Colossal spires made from what looked to be the same substance as the walls of their previous area rose up towards the cloudy sky, which gave off a pink-gold hue, illuminating this beautiful place in angelic light as orbs danced across the rushing water. The only thing that seemed menacing was what lay at the end of the long, winding river that seemed to be miles away. A column of black smoke that was as tall as the spires around it defaced the beautiful scene, but oddly enough, this wasn't what scared Phoebe the most. Within the smoke, she could see a giant, light blue circle of light that hovered eerily, contrasting hideously with the black smoke around it and making Phoebe shiver.

"This is the final step that all souls must take." Eve said, sensing there would be questions about their new location. She walked through the flowers that covered the platform they were standing on, managing to not crush any of them, "They jump from here, travel down the river… and reach their Nirvana." She stared out towards the powder blue disc that lay in the smoke far off in the distance.

"A leap of faith." Phoebe added with a sour tone, no longer thinking that this place was as majestic as she thought.

"Exactly." Eve replied stonily, "Omega, the ruler of the Crimson Era, was vanquished on this very plateau." She said, looking down at the flowers around her.

"I've never heard of any demon called Omega." Piper stated, folding her arms and looking towards the two whitelighters with an inquisitive stare.

"I'm not surprised." Adam responded flatly, "Omega was ordained as the first Source a century before the Crimson Era began. He was an unstoppable demon, wiping out an army of a thousand whitelighter warriors within just a few hours. It was that victory that led to Evil's golden age, a time of prosperity for demons, and a time of misery and sorrow for everyone else. The Hollow was the only impediment during this time, and was quickly dealt with by both sides before they returned to a battle Evil was sure to win." At this, he gave the Charmed Ones a warm grin, making them return the gesture with inane, smitten smiles of their own, "But then the witch was born."

"You were around at the time witches came into _existence_?" Paige asked in disbelieve, her mouth agape.

"They were the saviours of all good magic." Adam replied, "Three sister goddesses. Their names lost in the ravages of time, but their legacy shall live on as long as witches walk the earth." He looked to Piper, "The first goddess had the power over everything in the physical world and all its elements," He turned to Phoebe, "The second possessed an understanding and power over the minds of all living things, bringing peace to fraught emotions and fragile smiles." The whitelighter sought out Paige, only to find her preoccupied in muttering hushed words to a cluster of orbs in her outstretched palm, "And the third dealt strictly with the nether realm, bringing forth the eternal rest to those who had earned, and had the ability to bend all of nature's rules. Every power a witch can possess stems from these three."

"What happened?" Piper probed further with her sisters at her sides, intrigued at the learning of their Wiccan roots.

"Teamwork." Eve interjected, smiling slightly, "It's one of the many meanings of every Triple Goddess symbol in existence. Three working together as one, bringing forth unimaginable strength and light. Omega feared these three more than anything in his millennia long existence, and fled to the afterlife, where he sought to use every soul's limitless magical energy to stamp down this insurgence. We weren't about to let our realm be invaded and abused like that, so we turned the power against him."

"We had a stronger dominion over the dead, thus our connection won out and the souls consumed him, making him one of them." Adam continued, "As whitelighters, we have a more powerful link with the dead. We asked for their assistance, and they complied."

"The goddesses ascended into the heavens after Omega's defeat, leaving the remnants of their power behind for it to be continued until the end of time. These days, you three are the closest thing to a reincarnation that there ever has been." Eve added, a hint of pride and nostalgia in her voice before she blinked a few times, confused at her own show of emotion and composed herself quickly, "Let us get back to the matter at hand."

"Let's." Cole agreed verily, rolling his eyes, "This origins stuff is only vaguely interesting once, and I've already heard it before, so let's get back to the present. We have a future to save."

"Just because your kind doesn't descend from gods…" Paige murmured spitefully under her breath before returning to a normal volume, "So, where are we going now? Through that blue… portal thing?" She asked nervously, nodding to the enigmatic splash of colour with in the coal black smoke.

"No. That is life's end, and you will only ever see the other side of that portal when you die." Eve replied, "It was considered at the time protecting the Angel's Whisper from within it, but we decided to build another realm for it entirely. It was a lot of work, but I like to think that it was worth it."

"Why?"

"Because after a lifetime of battles, would you want your eternal rest interrupted by two graceless oafs recklessly destroying all in their path just to find something?"

Paige smiled sadly, a bittersweet tone in her voice as she thought of all the tortured souls in the other side of the blue portal, having finally earned their peace, "No… I guess not."

"Okay, so if we're not going there, we are we going?" Piper asked, looking around the flowery haven for another portal to see she could guess where their next destination was hidden.

"This way…" Adam answered, turning from them and taking with Eve as they outstretched their free arms. A trail of orbs shot from each of their palms, exploding in a mass of white light just in front of them and revealing a dark, rust coloured portal that continued to change its appearance with a variety of foreboding colours, the last even less inviting than the first. "We are the only two that can open the seal on this gate. It doesn't work with only one of us, so it prevents one of us being killed as a form of persuasion."

"Then how did Diam and Tyola get in?" Phoebe asked darkly, raising an eyebrow at the two whitelighter as they hesitated in their answer.

"They old beings, and with that, come magical knowledge that was thought to be lost long ago. It's entirely possible that they knew of a way to breach this realm when the Hollow was first sealed, but just didn't have a chance to use that knowledge before they were bound themselves." Eve replied calmly, tired of the particularly insulting questions that kept coming from the middle Charmed One, "Are you ready to fight?"

"Do we have a choice?" Piper inquired sourly, only getting a cryptic smile as a response.

They walked into the portal, the normal loss of sense of direction taking them over as they were transported. After all these years, the nausea and various side effects of traveling like this had worn off for the three witches, and now, traveling by portal was nothing but a mild annoyance. Once the odd sensations ceased, they realized they had arrived at their destination, but their sense of direction remained lost.

They were surrounded by nothing but a thick fog, water sloshing at their feet that was only around an inch deep when they took a step. What lay above brought them no comfort either, it was the exact same as what lay around them. For all the Charmed Ones knew, they were trapped in a dome of fog, "This way!" Adam urged almost immediately, charging off into the dank abyss and nearly abandoning the Charmed and Cole from the speed he was running through the shallow water, forcing the rest of the group to keep the same pace. As they ventured further into the unknown, echoes of arguing familiar voices began to fill the air, completely ruining the mystique.

"Just take it from the branch so we can get out of here! Those whitelighters will be coming after us any minute!"

"Do you want a repeat of what happened with the Devil's Eye?" Silence. "That's what I thought. This has to be handled carefully."

The group continued to run until the mist vanished suddenly, revealing an enclosed area that seemed to be completely clear. Within the centre, a giant, dead tree stood, its branches completely white and its trunk almost glowing from the water that surrounded it. An object resembling a dream catcher hung from one of the many branches, the only difference being where there was a usually a circle of patterned netting, a colourful portal of light lay instead. The pearly white feathers that hung from it resembled the flawless colour of the tree itself, making it blend in perfectly. The only thing that didn't belong was the two beings clad completely in black.

"Diam!" Tyola shouted as she turned around to face the Charmed Ones, one foot perched defiantly on the trunk of the tree as she glowered at the three witches.

"How the hell did you get here?" Diam growled, taking his hands down from the outstretched position there in as he had been reaching for the Angel's Whisper.

"We died." Piper responded sassily, a smug smirk creeping onto her lips, "Wanna see what feels like?" She threw out her own hands, summoning all her strength and using it to blast Diam back from the massive tree with a large explosion that detonated against his chest. The Hollow agent was thrown into the air, landing on the watery surface below with an undignified splash. "Paige, get that stupid artifact outta here!" The eldest Charmed One bellowed as she charged towards her downed target, Phoebe going in the other direction towards Tyola.

The witchlighter nodded once before holding out her hand as if she was carrying something that had a handle, "Angel's Whisper!" She called out. Orbs began to devour the hanging artifact, but were beaten back by a sudden white flash that passed over the object, causing Paige to make a face, "What happened?" She spun on Adam and Eve, who both looked apprehensive at this latest development.

"It's impervious to all magic. It was done so it couldn't be summoned away." Adam replied sadly, seeing how the protections that had been placed on the artifact were no longer working in their favour.

"Great!" Paige boomed, before striding towards the tree while her sisters held off their enemies.

"We really need to stop meeting like this." Tyola smirked, raising her hands as they began to glow with photokinetic energy that could easily burn Phoebe in a second. "Then, maybe we should just stop meeting altogether." She added, throwing her arms forward and letting lose two high power lasers that streaked through the misty atmosphere like a golden ray of sunlight.

Phoebe barely had time to use her telempathy, causing both lasers to veer off course before they hit her as she interfered with Tyola's mind, changing the way the attack went as the two beams coiled round the witch's body and flew back at their caster, pummeling the ghostly pale woman in the chest and throwing her back into the water, smoke rising from her still body. "I couldn't agree more." Phoebe replied in a bored tone. The middle Charmed One made the mistake of approaching her, allowing Tyola to fly to her feet and kick Phoebe in the face, sending her to the floor immediately with a bloody nose.

"Oh, look at that. I never knew spirits could bleed!" Tyola said in sarcastic triumph as the witch wiped her face. "You might as well wipe the smirk off while you're at it."

At this, Phoebe suddenly looked up at her enemy, her head whipping upwards as her eyes narrowed before a psionic blast flew from her forehead and into Tyola's mind, throwing her back far enough to let Phoebe regain her footing, her hair now damp from being thrown into the water below, "You talk far too much." She spat, a sneer appearing on her face as her combatant got up to face her.

Wordlessly, a psionic blast flew from Tyola's head, having just copied the power from its usage on her. Phoebe, thinking fast, retaliated with a psionic blast of her own, both attacks colliding between them and resulting in a psychic shockwave that hurled the two warriors apart and into the shallow water far away from one another.

Piper's face began to go red as she tried to hold her impervious armour of cracked orange lines that ran across her body. Diam was keeping her pinned down with an unending barrage of explosions, flicking his hands out again and again. Finally, the Charmed One could no longer hold her breath and she was struck back into the water by the effect of her own power. She gritted her teeth as she pushed herself up, growling at Diam as he advanced.

"It this all that you are?" He asked in a disgusted tone, "The mighty Charmed Ones, the eldest of whom being the most feared in all the Underworld with offensive powers unmatched by any other being." He bent over, glaring at her as she struggled to get up, "You're nothing but a bug that needs to be stepped on."

Piper suddenly raised her hands, laying her freezing power on him as he attempted to bring down a punch. "Ever met a bug that can punch like this?" She growled, taking in a breath and massing out her fist, throwing it into Diam's jaw and sending high into the air for him to land with a sickly thud. Seeing that her opponent had been taken care of, Piper took this time to assess the situation. She saw Phoebe and Tyola, far apart from one another, unconscious in the shallow water with Cole going to her sister's aid while Paige struggled to untie the string that kept the Angel's Whisper tied to the tree branch. "What is the matter with you?" She shrieked when she reached her youngest sister, "If ever there was a time to move something with your mind, it's now!"

"Magic doesn't affect it!" Paige snapped back, before both of them suddenly flew backwards, landing at Adam and Eve's feet after rolling through the water for several turns before stopping, having been a victim of the telekinetic abilities Diam had copied from Paige two years ago.

The being in question gave his enemies a stony stare as he sauntered up to the tree once more and violently ripped the Angel's Whisper from the tree branch. "Tyola! We've got it, let's go!"

"Finally!" Tyola snapped in response, flipping herself to her feet and running over to her partner. She stood next to Diam, her bushy hair tangled and soaking from the numerous tumbles she had taken into the water during the fight. Laying a hand on his shoulder, Tyola grinned widely at the reformed group in front of them, Phoebe hold onto Cole for support as they hobbled over, "It's always a pleasure, Charmed Ones!" She cooed, before she and Diam burst into a swirl of particles and left, taking the Angel's Whisper with them.

* * *

"Spirits of air, sand and sea, converge to set the angel free, in the wind I send this rhyme, bring Death before me, before my time."

Pamela looked up from the torn Book of Shadows page in her hand and towards the endless ocean in front of her. Her bare feet had been completely submerged by the sweeping sand brought in by the tide, her toes wiggling beneath a sandy surface that was up to her ankles. She shook her head slowly, muttering under her breath when it seemed the spell hadn't even worked. She was about to give up entirely and walk away, before jumping in fright as Death stood right beside her, casting a shadow across her body and blocking the sunlight.

"You look like Death." He drawled, a thin smile forming at his own joke.

"What took you so long?"

"I'm not like your average pitiful demon, witch. I don't immediately get whisked away the moment I'm summoned. I chose to answer, and depending on what you have to say, I may stay." His expression turned pensive as he folded his arms, looking down on her with scornful pity, "If you summoned me to plead for your innocent's soul, then the answer is no. It's out of my hands now."

"How did you know?" Pamela asked quietly, the rushing sounds of the ocean fading out in her hearing.

"You have that look in your eyes."

"What look?"

"The look that says you can't bear to have another death on your conscience." He replied gravely, "Do you really think you're the first witch to come to me, begging to return an innocent's life? They know full well it's not in my power to do so, but they try anyway, despite the fact that witches no longer need to care about an innocent once they're dead. You see, it doesn't come from genuine sorrow over a person losing their life; it comes from the guilt, from the failed responsibility. This is about appeasing your own issues, not your innocent's." He snarled.

"You're wrong. Eden died because I acted like brat about protecting her. It's my fault she's-,"

"Be quiet." Death said firmly, cutting her off before rolling his eyes, "I'm not hearing about why Eden Gareth should be brought back, all I'm hearing is your resounding guilt that saturates your words. This is nothing but a selfish act concealed in noble intentions. Your mother summoned me for the exact same reason."

"Don't even compare me to her; I'm nothing like my mother." Pamela snarled in response, tears prickling her eyes."

"Oh, but you are." He replied smoothly, "Now, I'm going to tell you something that everyone in your life has probably wanted to say to you but just hasn't: get over it."

"Excuse me?"

"This guilt you're feeling is so self-absorbed, it's sickening. Your brother mercilessly slaughtered hundreds of people over the years, never feeling a thing as they knife went in, draining the life from all those witches." He continued, ignoring Pamela's visible flinch, "You, on the other hand, kill him in the least personal way by shooting him, giving him a quick, almost painless death and yet, you destroy yourself over it. The only thing that made killing him different from vanquishing a demon was the personal connection, which wasn't that strong to begin with!" Death argued, his voice raised slightly, "Stop manufacturing feelings because you think they're necessary, and don't bother calling me ever again." With that, he vanished in a wreath of blue smoke and left her to contemplate his advice.

Pamela turned back to the ocean, her feet still with in the sand despite her position shift. She didn't even care when the waves soaked the ends of her rolled up jeans, all she could feel was the rush of the ocean and the soothing sound of the waves bursting into the rocks nearby. With a deep breath, tears began to run down her cheeks. She felt lighter somehow. The golden heart shaped necklace, which had felt heavier around her neck since Arc's destruction, no longer felt like such a burden. She opened her eyes and stared out into the horizon, before something that she hadn't done in weeks.

She smiled.

* * *

Phoebe sat on the edge of the glowing platform, looking out towards the orbs that were floating around the circular walls that enclosed this place. She swung her legs in a childish away, looking all the way down to the pit of black orbs that lay below, before looking up at where they had just come from, where the top of the path was bathed in light. After finding the good side of the afterlife slightly frightening, she dreaded to think what it was like in the realm beneath her.

"How's your nose?" Cole asked, sitting down beside her and mimicking her position.

"Fine, I think." She replied, rubbing her swollen nose slightly, "It's just a spiritual injury, so I'm guessing it won't be on my body when I go back into the living world…" They sat in silence for a few moments, watching the many orbs float by before Phoebe spoke again, "I couldn't imagine spending an eternity constantly going up and down this path, never knowing what lay after… Living a half-life." She said mournfully, "But then again, I guess this is the path that was mapped out for you all along with you being a hybrid of human and demon."

"I guess." Cole said quietly, "And speaking of paths, have you made a decision about your little dilemma?"

Phoebe smiled slightly, looking down, "I don't know yet."

"Well, I was thinking about it, and all I've ever wanted is for you to be happy, Phoebe." He responded, seeming to be slightly embarrassed by this, "And I think that if Brennan makes you happy, then I'm completely for you following him to wherever he goes… and besides, your kids are adorable, you don't want all that city smog ruining them. The country air's better."

Despite her confliction, Phoebe managed to laugh slightly, silently nothing that he had managed to get Brennan's name correct, "Thank you for your blessing, it factored heavily into my decision making process." She said sarcastically, biting her lip as he also looked down, laughing a little. Without any warning, she suddenly turned his head to hers and pressed their lips together. Cole's eyes widened briefly before he realized what was happening. Unfortunately for him, it was too late to intensify it, as Phoebe pulled away as quickly as she had initiated it.

"W-What was…? What was that for?" He stuttered.

"It was for more my benefit than yours, trust me." Phoebe replied with a smile, getting up and squeezing his shoulder as she walked away, "Goodbye, Cole." She said sweetly, still leaving her ex-husband speechless about what had just happened and completely unaware that he had helped her make her decision.

"So, now that they have the Angel's Whisper, is there anything we should look out for?" Piper asked, folding her arms and waiting for the bad answer she knew was heading her way.

Eve, for the first time since they had met her, hesitated before answering, clearly not knowing what to say, "The full extent of the Angel's Whisper's powers are unknown… But, it existence is sustained on the hopes and dreams of the people, and given the hands that it's fallen into, its anyone's guess what they could do with it." Their attention was directed when Death smoked in, really to take them back to their bodies.

"So basically, we wait." Paige said ruefully, shaking her head sadly as she concocted all the possible scenarios.

"Sadly, yes." Adam replied, "Just be on guard. You three are their clear targets, as your Power of Three is strong enough to destroy the seal on the Hollow… I'm sorry we couldn't intervene during the battle."

"It's okay. After all this time, we're starting to finally understand the consequences thing."

"Are you ready, or would you rather stay here?" Death asked them, his lips twisting into a smile. He decided not to tell the witches about his encounter with Pamela, as for starters, it had nothing to do with him, and secondly, she would benefit more if she went through this alone. The immortal being mentally slapped himself for being so connected in the ways of the living, before composing himself and resuming his intimidating demeanour.

"Just get us out of here, will you?" Piper snapped, her eyes narrowed.

"Very well." Imitating the same gesture he had done to drain their spirits, Death swept his hand across the trio, causing them all to evaporate into thin wisps of blue smoke that flew up into the ether, returning the Charmed Ones to the world of the living, and leaving the four immortal beings alone in the silent darkness with only the anguished moans of lost souls to console them.

"Good luck, Charmed Ones…"

* * *

"_How does she do that?"_

Brennan sat on the steps of basement that was he and Phoebe's homemade gym, marveling at how his wife had stayed still for so long. Maybe it had something to do with the electric current constantly pulsing through his body, but Brennan could never stay still for long. Even sitting here watching her meditate for ten minutes was starting to give him a desire to unleash some energy. And yet she was still like stone, her hands resting on her knees in her crossed legged position. Her utter lack of movement was frustrating for the mutant in a way, as he too sometimes wished he had the patience to be still for just one moment and collect his thoughts.

"I heard we lost the innocent." Phoebe said, her eyes flashing open. She smiled when it was clear he was surprised that she had known he was there, "The third step on the stairs has a really quiet creak. That and when you try and make no sound, you end up making a lot of sound."

"Good to know." Brennan responded with a grin, "And yeah, we left Pam alone with her, knowing that she wasn't up to fighting if it came down to that, but we went off to work anyway... which makes me see that moving across the country really isn't a good idea, regardless of the house's importance."

"Brennan-,"

"No, you were right before, it's just too much. And today taught me that. We were all in town, and yet that poor woman still lost her life. Can you imagine what it would be like if we were in _Wisconsin_? So, no, I don't think we should move." Although he was smiling, his eyes betrayed his true emotions to Phoebe, who smiled back at him.

"That's funny, because I was just about to say we should."

Brennan's head shot up from its bowed position, "What?"

"It's funny, spending the day in the afterlife makes you really appreciate what you have in life. I faced some of my demons, and I made a decision." She got up from her sitting position and walked across to him, smiling at the double entendre of her statement as she leant on the banister of the stairs, "I don't want to live the rest of life, always putting being a witch before everything else. Nearly everyone in my family has done that. Even my sister, Prue, and look how she turned out: Dead. Way before her time. I wanna break that cycle of death that's plagued my family for centuries and live!" Phoebe leant forward slightly so she could put her arms around Brennan's neck, "So, let's do it. Let's take that leap of faith. I'll quit my job and work on the farm or something; you can be a silent owner of your garage, and we'll both have a lot more free time to watch our kids grow up in the best place we were able to give them…"

"… Are you absolutely sure?" He asked seriously, staring into her eyes as he placed his hands on her hips.

"Absolutely. Maybe I'll write a book or something!" She replied with a smile.

"Alright then…" Brennan said quietly, before a beaming grin spread across his face. "Wisconsin, here we come! …There's just one thing."

"What?"

"Have you ever milked a cow?"

* * *


	38. Euphoria

_I am so sorry for the big delay you guys! I took some time out to study for my exams and I had barely started this chapter before that, so I had a lot to do after I had done all my exams. Anyway, I hope you all enjoy the chapter (Although by reviews, it would seem only one person is reading.). And don't forget to review! I really want your thoughts on these final chapters, and review replies will be posted on my website, the link to which can be found in my profile!_

**Euphoria**

Piper hummed sweetly as she spread butter over a piece of wholemeal bread, before placing it on the top of the sandwich she had now finished making. The morning sun was pouring through the kitchen window of the Manor, illuminating her in an angelic glow as she pressed her hand down lightly on the sandwich. She continued to hum as she reached for the foil wrap, only stopping briefly when a strand of her hair came loose from the tight bun it had been wrapped into, forcing her to tuck it behind her. She made a mental note to fix it later. It was untidy to leave it like that, but then again, it would be very unhygienic to start playing with her hair as she prepared food.

The sounds of nearing footsteps reached Piper's ears as she began to fill the sink with water, resuming her humming, "Hun, have you seen my keys?" Dan asked as he entered the kitchen, padding himself down and looking wildly around the room as his wife to calmly run water, "I'm going to end up being late, and I hate being late when I'm showing a blueprint to a client for the first time…"

"They're on the foyer table, sweetheart." Piper called sweetly, rolling her eyes with an elated smile. He _always_ left his keys on the foyer table, and he _always_ forgot that that was where he had put them. After eleven years of marriage, Piper had noticed that Dan had developed a traceable pattern on where he left his keys. For her, it was just a matter of knowing what day it was.

"Got them!" Her husband shouted to her from his new location in the foyer, "See you later, honey!" She could hear the frenzied footsteps of her daughter bolting down the stairs in fear of her father leaving without her. After all, it was very rare for Dan to have the time to drive his daughter to school, and Katie didn't want to miss it.

The woman's eyes suddenly widened with shock as she spun around; her hair flying out of the bun and exploding outwards like a beautiful firework, sweeping down onto her back and glimmering in the sunlight, "Wait! Don't forget your-!" The front door slammed shut, silence instantly filling the Manor, "Lunches…" She looked to the two brown paper bags on the counter mournfully before taking a deep breath, plastering another disconcerting smile onto her face and swiftly picking up the two bags to put them into the fridge, returning to humming a song she had never known, and was never meant to have known of.

* * *

Phoebe stormed through the large expanse that was the penthouse's large living room, heading for the pair of wide open French doors that led to a beautiful view of the Bay. She hurriedly tied her silk robe together, glaring at the newspaper that acted as a barrier between her and her husband as he sat at the outside table. "I want that maid fired." She demanded, her hands gripping the back of a chair tightly, "She's repulsive. I woke this morning to her polishing my nightstand, and I thought the mole on her moustache was going to attack me." She wrenched the chair out from under the table and sat down with a pouted lip, "Well?"

"Baby, I'm not going to fire the help because they're unattractive." Jason told her absentmindedly, barely acknowledging her presence, "Besides, you're in no position to tell me what to do, seeing as how I'm paying for your car repairs yet again. Do you even have a driver's license? Or do you just swing the wheel around like a loon and hope the best?"

"I'm just the not best city driver, that's all." She replied loftily, pouring herself a cup of much needed coffee as she did so.

"That's what the chauffeur is for." Jason replied condescendingly, going back to his paper and making his wife sneer in contempt.

"Reading the paper that you own? That's a little narcissistic, don't you think?" She said acidly, taking a fresh muffin from the basket that was always lying on the table in the morning. She was never up early enough to see who actually put the basket there, and she didn't really care.

"It's called keeping an eye on my investment." He snapped back, taking out a sheet and putting it down on the table in front of her, not even looking up once again, "There, read the 'Karen Cares' advice column quickly so I look at the Business section."

Phoebe looked down at the part of the paper, despair etched onto her face as she picked at the muffin, instantly losing her appetite. "I haven't read that column in ages. The woman's been losing her edge gradually for years now and it's sad to read." She stated, sliding the paper back towards her husband, "I told you her writing lacks emotional depth and her one dimensional answers are a clear sign of her just wanting to get through the work and not help people. Do you not remember me telling you that?"

"If you only got that Psychology degree to berate me during breakfast, then that tuition was a waste of money." He replied edgily, finally listening to her and putting down the paper after folding it in half, "I'm not going to be in tonight. I've got a few late meetings, then a meet and greet with some prospective business partners." He raised an eyebrow, trying to catch her attention as she picked at the muffin, "Phoebe?"

"Alright…" She replied meekly, barely feeling his hand brush across her shoulder as he got up and left. If she had learned anything from her degree, it was that people always had a tell when they were lying. Jason's was to try and maintain eye contact all the way through, probably from hearing that lack of eye contact was a sign of lying. Phoebe found it ironic that the only time he remotely looked at her was when he lied to her. The times when he'd stare right into her eyes and poison the air with lies, while reeking of another woman's perfume were the worst, but she'd just accept it and go along with it.

She just didn't care anymore.

* * *

Paige had always hated this part of owning a sports store. The part where she had to get her hands dirty.

A loud curse word flew from her mouth as the oily bike chain slipped from her greasy hand once more, just as she had almost got it back on the teeth. She wiped her brow, getting oil on her forehead and not even realizing. She was glad of the large delivery door that was at the back of the store, as it let in the strong sea breeze that was their prize for having a store down at the Embarcadero, and helped to keep her cool in the run up to summer, where the temperature would rise harshly all of a sudden and not give her body time to adjust. It was a miracle that, given the amount of traveling Paige did, her body was able to settle in one climate.

The bell that hung over the entrance at the front of the door rang out, causing Paige to curse under her breath once more, "Be with you in a minute, Sir! … Or Ma'am!"

"It's only me!"

"Thank God!" Paige shouted back, glad to hear her husband's voice as he walked into the storage room, "I can't get this damn chain back on and the guy is coming to pick the bike up in ten minutes. I can fix brakes, change handlebar, fit pegs… I can completely build a bike from scratch until I get to this thing!"

Glenn chuckled slightly, throwing her a towel to wipe the oil away from her hands, "It's okay, I'll get it. You have a look at these photos. I'm not sure if the camera worked alright after we took it in the water." He said with a slight cringe, placing the white plastic bag onto the counter and kneeling to down to finish the job.

"Well, I did tell you just to use one of those underwater disposable ones." Paige replied, opening up the envelope and taking out the pile of photographs. She was well aware that she could have these forever kept on a computer, but Paige loved to have photos like this, much to the chagrin of Glenn, who usually had to go and collect them once they were developed. "Well, the Great Barrier Reef pictures are fine, so I'm guessing the camera still worked afterwards…" A beaming smile burst across her face as she saw another photograph, "Aw! Look at this one of Lila in front of Ayers Rock at sunset. She looks so cute with her sunglasses."

"I still can't believe we made round the whole of Australia in two weeks," Glenn remarked, slipping the chain onto the teeth with ease and spinning the pedal around to make sure it worked properly. "For a minute there, I thought we wouldn't make the return flight."

"Oh, come on, we've been in worse jams than that." Paige scoffed, "Do you remember the time we got stuck in Italy because we lost our passports? Now that was a time I thought we were really screwed." She set down the photos on the surface behind her as Glenn stood up to face her, "Oh, and almost forget. The box of new kneepads came while you were away. I still need to put them out on display. I was gonna do it right after I finished with the bike but you can see how that turned out."

"It's okay. I'll take care of it." Glenn replied with a boundless smile, "You go home and take a shower or something. You really make a mess when you play around with bikes." He said with a smirk, before walking back towards the front of the store, flipping the car keys in her direction as he went, "I'll make sure that the guy knows you worked like hell on his bike."

"Okay," Paige called back as she headed towards the parking lot that lay behind the store, catching her reflection in the glass of the exit door and seeing that she was covered in oil. Her mouth stood agape for a few seconds, before she just smiled and walking out into the blazing heat, her skin sun kissed from all the traveling she had done. A little oil was never going to get her down, especially on a day like this.

It was just too perfect.

* * *

The rising water shot through the sunlight pouring in through the broken window of the Great Hall, casting shimmering bands of light through the water and onto the shadow beneath as Pamela and Aidan appeared in the ruins of the hall, their forms quickly taking shape before the water fell away, revealing them. Immediately, Pamela's eyes went wide at what lay around her, relaxing when she saw they were alone, "You know, you could have splashed into a classroom down the corridor or something. Suddenly appearing in the enemy's main hang out is never a good safety preserver."

"Your argument would have grounds if we had been killed by now." Aidan replied dryly, looking around the remains of the giant hall as the morning run flooded it with light, giving the ruins a certain beauty. "Besides, if they're not here, they must have something to do with the girls' disappearance."

"But where would they go?" Pamela thought out loud, "I mean, they're the enemy of both good and evil, it's just that good is the only side actually doing something about the threat of impending doom… Well, I say good, when really, it's just the seven of us." She folded her arms, looking up to a large hole in the ceiling and seeing a perfect blue sky, as it was always in this realm, "Is it possible that they just went out on an early morning demon hunt and didn't tell you guys?"

"No, Paige is always the one to get the kids ready in the morning because of my hours, and since I was woken up to find the disaster that was my children trying to make their own breakfast, I don't think this is just a simple matter of them going out and losing track of time. Especially since Diam and Tyola got hold of the Angel's Whisper…"

"Oh, what, you think something that's powered by _hopes_ and _dreams_ vaporized three of the most powerful forces of good on the planet?"

"Well, I didn't until now."

Pamela rolled her eyes, "Come on, despite it being a superpower, I think its ability is probably a little more passive than that." She was quick to notice the pained expression on her uncle's face and instantly addressed it, "Okay, what's with the guilty look? What do you know?"

"Nothing, and that's what frustrating me." He shook his head angrily, biting his lip, "I mean, she was taken from her bed, right _next_ to me, and I didn't even wake up. Maybe if I had…"

"Don't do this to yourself." She cut him off immediately, "If anything, you should feel least guilty about all this. You work erratic hours, you need your sleep a lot more than Leo and Brennan, so if anyone should feel guilty for not waking up, it's those two slobs." She linked her arm with his and hit it lightly, "C'mon, they're not here. Let's go back to the Manor for some old fashioned scrying instead of randomly checking out places." With that, the two vanished in the same manner in which they had appeared, the water glistening in the sun before it dissipated completely.

Positive that the two had gone, Tyola crept out from behind the broken door of the Great Hall, having heard everything. She breathed a sigh of relief, the being's grey eyes flashing in panic for the briefest of moments. Her expression remained cautiously nervous as she gripped to the thick oak door, before bursting into a cloud of particles that flew out of the hall and high into the sky.

* * *

Where Tyola reappeared was a stark contrast with where she had come from, with only the dim glow of a light sphere that she had conjured herself a few hours ago. It had been a stroke of genius to use this cavern. Thanks to the importance of the Devil's Eye, the dome shaped marble had been hexed, charmed, and magicked to the point where the only way to get in was by physically finding the entrance behind the Source's throne. No magic could get in or out. They were completely safe here. "The elemental was at Magic School looking for them, I should have known they'd be on to us quickly."

Diam didn't respond. His eyes had gone completely white as he continued to use the Angel's Whisper that hung from his hand. The artifact was glowing fiercely, the faint, melodic thrum of an ancient song echoing through the cave as it worked its magic on the three unconscious witches below, each still in their sleeping attire. Three tendrils of white light stretched from the Angel's Whisper and went into the head of each Charmed One, moving across their foreheads like a bolt of electricity against the glass of a plasma ball. A thin layer of sweat covered Diam's face, before the strings of energy suddenly disappeared and his eyes turned back to normal, "Are you alright?" Tyola asked coldly as her partner doubled over with his hands on his knees.

"Yes, this process is just taking more out of me than I thought it would…" He breathed in response, wiping his forehead with his arm and taking a deep breath.

"The Angel's Whisper is powered by the limitless energy of the user's soul. You have no soul, so it's feeding right off your magic, which isn't nearly as eternal." Tyola explained, giving him a dark look as he leaned back on the podium that once held the counterpart of the artifact that was in his hands. "Don't you realize what you're doing? You're conjuring a world that not only links three minds, but only has fleeting thoughts as a foundation. You might as well have made this world from your own hands from the start. It's taking too much out of you, and you haven't even tricked _one_ of them into saying the power relinquishment spell!"

"We have no way of extracting the magic of the Power of Three with them dead, so we can't kill them, the Devil's Eye is gone, and the Angel's Whisper cannot be destroyed." Diam replied fiercely, glaring at her, "Tricking them into giving up their powers is the only option left. Besides, the old Source did it and nearly succeeded, and we're twice as powerful as he was."

"Yes, but the world you're creating is around _three_ times more powerful than the one he created, and he was also mortally injured by a lower level demon because he had been weakened so much." Tyola rebutted, an eyebrow raised, "Not to mention you're have to work to make sure their real memories don't come pouring through and spoil your plan… God, covering up a three lifetimes worth of memories and replacing them… You had better hope we're not found, because we'll be sitting ducks with the amount of power you're wasting."

"Enough…" He growled, raising the Angel's Whisper into the air again, "They get put into stasis every time I take a break, but I don't know for how long. I need to go back." With that, his eyes turned a milky white once more, energy pouring from the centre of the artifact and pouring into the downed Charmed Ones' heads once again, the ancient hymn beginning to play the moment the energy hit them.

* * *

Phoebe sauntered into the autoshop, humming a peaceful tune as she walked. She sighed angrily at what she saw. He was still working on her car. She was quickly made aware that she was being ogled at when the other mechanics were less than subtle in checking her out, outright stopping what they were doing to stare at her. She didn't mind through, it was the most attention she got from men. "Hey, grease monkey!" The woman shouted at the mechanic's back as he was bent over the engine of her car, "You said my car would be done by noon. It's nearly two and you're still goofing around. What the hell would you have done if I got here on time?"

Brennan rolled his eyes as he turned around to face Phoebe, towering over her far smaller form and staring at the outrageous pair of sunglasses she was wearing. He sighed angrily as he wiped his hands clean from oil, making sure that the dirty cloth brushed against her a few times he rolled it round his palms. "Mrs. Dean, your car was ready three hours ago. I was just using your _delayed_ arrival to give it a second look. As soon as you've paid, you can go, alright?"

"Good. This place makes me sick." She responded acidly, storming after him as he led her towards the small room at the back of autoshop that doubled as the establishment's office. He opened the door for her, given her a saccharine smile as she passed him and took off her sunglasses, leaning against the desk with an eyebrow raised, "Alright, how much do I owe you?" She asked as the door closed.

Brennan gave her an amused grin, "Won't your husband just pay for it?"

Phoebe's eyes flashed with anger, before she too, broke out into a grin, "How was I this time? I thought I would lay on the mega bitch routine really thick."

"You were great, as always." Brennan responded, moving towards the woman, grasping her by the hips and sitting her on his desk, leaving oily handprints on her white skirt as he trailed them up her body to gently grasp her head as he kissed her neck softly, all the while she clung to the back of his sweaty hair, her eyes closed in ecstasy. She always loved the way he smelled. A mixture of oil and sweat. It was such a difference from the sterile environment she was used to, and a welcome change.

"I think he's starting to suspect something's going on…" Phoebe whispered, making Brennan stop immediately.

"He thinks you're cheating on him?"

"Maybe no, but he is wondering why my car is constantly in the shop." She replied with a small smirk, running her hands over his face and down his chest. "He's going out for a business thing tonight, so we have the place to ourselves. Chandra will be asleep, so-,"

"A business thing?" Brennan scoffed, rolling his eyes with contempt, "You mean he's going out to cheat on you again… Man, he's lucky he doesn't come down here to pay for these repairs in person." He growled lowly, "Why don't you just leave him and we can stop sneaking around? I'm kinda getting tired of having to hate you in public and only love you behind closed doors."

"Hey, people in glass houses…" Phoebe rightly pointed out, gesturing to their immediate situation, "And I can't leave. Chandra… He has the money to give her the best of everything in life, and I want that for her. And if we were to get divorced, I would probably never get to see my daughter again. He's a millionaire with an army of the best lawyers in the country and I'm the unemployed trophy wife. Who do you think custody would go to? No, trust me, its better this way."

"Alright… What time should I come over tonight?"

"A little after eight. He leaves before that, but it's just to be on the safe side. I'll send the staff home for the night, and Chandra will be asleep." She looked down at her now oily skirt, smiling as she wrapped her jacket around herself more so the stains wouldn't be visible when she went outside. "You're I'm wearing this." She said with a smirk.

"I'd rather you weren't wearing anything at all." He retorted with a smile that almost made her want to stay.

"Save it for later…" She breathed, gripping his hair with her hand once more as she crashed her lips against his, catching them in a chaste kiss before she slid off the desk, gently pushing him away and readjusting her hair as she left, making sure that her coat was completely wrapped around her.

* * *

Slow business days were both a blessing and a curse. On the good side, it would give Glenn and Paige a lot of time to themselves as a couple, and it would let them check stock and do inventory during the day without having to give up their nights to do it. On the bad side, it would mean a dip in profits, and intense boredom just from sitting at the register all day. The only sale they had made all day was to a redhead who had bought running shoes because she was interested in running the annual city marathon. Glenn ran in it every year, and had immediately classed their customer as a novice. She must have picked up the vibe of his opinion, as she was cold towards him for the rest of her visit, and only addressed Paige when making her purchase.

"Paige, can you call Andrew Trudeau and tell him that I finished restringing his tennis racket? And tell him if he's still hung up about that woman, he shouldn't take it out on his racket." Glenn called from the back of the shop, snapping Paige out of her daydream at the front desk.

"Yeah, sure!" She called back, pulling the computer keyboard towards her and typing in their customer's name, faltering slightly when it came to spelling the second half of it before her cellphone began to vibrate next to her. Frowning, she picked it up and flipped it open, rolling her eyes at what she saw. She had been getting these anonymous text messages recently, saying the same thing every time. They weren't doing any harm or scaring her, they were just annoying.

Glenn came out into the front of the shop and read over her shoulder, mimicking her frown with a confused smile, "Did you sign up for a rhyme a day or something?"

"Nah, it's just probably some advertisement." She said sourly, closing her phone and setting it down on the counter again, "Alright, heart broken Trudeau, here we come…"

* * *

"… So anyway, I'm still convinced that he didn't give me the right amount of change. I think I'm going to put a complaint into the manager the next time I'm in, because I go to a supermarket to buy groceries, not to be _robbed_." Prue finished indignantly, stirring the sugar into the teacup in front of her before passing it to her mother with a smile, "Piper, are you even listening to me?" She snapped, staring at her sister's back as she stared out of the front window.

"Ignore her; she's been like this all day." Patty answered with a roll of her eyes, bringing her tea to her lips while the television played as background noise, "I think you should just let Roger handle something like this. I mean, that's what husbands are for. They should stand up for their wife's honour."

"Maybe… I would kinda like to handle this myself. Besides, he's so busy with work these days that I wouldn't want to bother him. He's been working late every night for the past month, sometime he's even had to leave the office to go to the client!" Prue replied with annoyance, shaking her head at the whole situation. "Of course, that's left me in the house alone a lot, what with Pam going out to _not_ find a job…"

"Is she still giving you trouble?"

"Yesterday, she tried to dye her hair blonde, but her natural colour's too dark for one of those DIY dye jobs to work, so it went this horrible shade of red. She looks like a lion. Although I don't even know if she's noticed with the amount of pot she's been smoking recently."

"You caught her in the act?"

"Smelled it when she walked in the door. I'm _this_ close to throwing her out. She's nearly twenty two, and ever since she found me all those years ago, it's been trouble. Roger shouldn't have to put up with a child that isn't even his."

"Maybe Andy could talk to her."

"Sure, if you can pull him away from the police station… Are we boring you, Piper? You've been staring out that window for nearly ten minutes."

Piper's eyes narrowed as she gently moved the lace curtain out of her view, glaring at a small house across the street, "Doris Underwood invited that UPS man in over five minutes ago. What could she possibly be doing with a delivery man that takes more than five minutes?" She mused in a suspicious tone, causing Patty to shake her head disapprovingly at her daughter's comments.

"I thought I raised you girls not to gossip." She said curtly, glowering at Piper as she moved away from the window and sat down on the sofa. "Where are your manners? You don't spy on your neighbours."

Piper snorted with laughter, "I think you're talking to wrong sister about manners, Mom. I could get Phoebe on the phone if you want, seeing as how I'm the only one who has any remote contact with her."

"I'm not going to speak to that tramp as long as I live…" Prue growled, taking a sip of her own tea.

"Let's not get into this again, Prue." Piper groaned. It had been fourteen years since Phoebe had apparently fooled around with Roger. A straight answer from both participants had never been given, but Prue had chosen to stand by her fiancée and disown Phoebe. It hadn't been as immediate for the rest of the family, but eventually, with two of the bigger Halliwell personalities at a permanent disagreement, Phoebe had just slowly vanished from their lives. As silence fell on the room, they all tuned into the TV, where a mindless quiz show had been playing in the background of their conversation.

"What was the teaser line for the sequel to the popular supernatural film, "Enchanted"?"

"Wasn't it something to do with books and powers?" Patty piped up with a frown.

"Yeah." Prue replied, "It was 'From whence they came, return them now, vanish the book, vanish our powers."

Piper rolled her eyes, "You're both wrong. It was 'From whence they came, return them now, vanish the _words_, vanish our powers." She smiled triumphantly when the contestant echoed what she had said and got the question correct. All of a sudden, the smile vanished and was replaced by blank expression. Something inside her broke. Memories from another life began to rush into her head and she felt out of place almost immediately. She continued to process what was happening to her, before her jaw dropped in shock and she let out an angry sigh at what she had just done.

"Aw, crap!"

* * *

A ghostly glow emitted from Piper's body, slightly illuminating the dark cavern as a stream of white lights from her chest and into the jar that was standing atop the pedestal that used to house the Devil's Eye. Tyola opened up the jar as the powers flew towards it, flooding the small glass container with light before the lid snapped shut by itself. "Its actually working…" She said, surprised. For the first time since the plan's conception, she confidently smirked at the three unconscious bodies lying on the floor.

Diam remained catatonic, his eyes glowing fiercely as sweat covered his face. The Angel's Whisper was continuing to drain power from him, and he knew it. It was power he would never get back, and it was a power loss that would probably kill him, but it didn't matter. The Hollow would be free after this, and he would be reborn for his sacrifice. After all, it all came down to sacrifice in the end.

* * *

Piper cursed as she jiggled the doorknob of the door as it continued to restrict her access to the attic. "Come on!" She shouted, taking a few steps back and jerking her hands out towards the door, resulting in no effect whatsoever, "Damn it!" She cursed again, before rolling her eyes at the insanity of her situation. "I'll just have to Phoebe my way in…" She murmured to herself, looking down at her feet and cursing again when she saw she was wearing flimsy, flat soled shoes, rather than thick heeled boots that would obliterate the rickety lock.

"Piper, just what has gotten into-? Piper!" Prue yelped, her body flinching in fright when her younger sister suddenly threw her shoulder against the attic door, visibly wincing afterwards. She had never seen Piper display such violence in her entire life, and was even more confused when she saw her peering at the lock of the door, "What is the matter with you? What are you looking at?"

"A door." Piper responded dryly, grinning at the vicious crack that was now running across the wood around the doorknob. "Man, I must not know my own strength. One more should do it…" She muttered, completely ignoring her elder sister's ravings about her sudden violent turn and throwing herself at the door once again.

It flew open, sending Piper racing into the attic due to the momentum in which she had thrown herself at the door. A sudden pain suddenly shot up and down her left shoulder and arm, causing the witch to look down and guessing she had probably dislocated it. Being no stranger to the occasional popped joint, Piper was swift in her solution, shoving the bone back into place with other wince of pain, "There… That's better."

Now that her injury had been tended to, Piper was able to look around her new surroundings and was instantly winded by her own disappointment.

The attic was completely empty. So empty, in fact, that it seemed Piper's forced entry had kicked up the layer of dust on the floor, and was now easy to see with the sunlight streaming through the grimy windows that looked like they hadn't been washed in years. It seemed so big and cold, and instantly made the eldest Charmed One miss her real home, in all its messy glory. "Oh, no… No, no, no, no…" She murmured to herself as Prue came up behind her, still bemused at her sister's behaviour.

"Wow, look at all the space up here!" She gasped, "You should convert it into something, like an entire floor for guests, a massive closet-,"

"Or a massive pig sty like it's supposed to be." Piper interrupted, steamrolling over Prue's comments. "This isn't right…" She suddenly turned on her big sister, her eyes wide and tightly tied back hair now slightly askew, "Um… Prue, lemme ask you something. Did Grams… leave us anything? Like, a big book, or a chest full of weird occult stuff?" The Book of Shadows was really what she was after, but at this point, their trunk of disgusting and smelly ritual items seemed like it would be a Godsend.

Prue snorted at the question, folding her arms with a sneer, "Yeah, right, like that bitch left us anything other than severe self confidence issues, always criticizing… You'd think, being the toughest lawyer in town, she would have left a nice lump sum of money to help her granddaughters look after her sick daughter, but no, all she left us was this crappy house." Her features instantly softened as she finished her sentence, "No offence, you and Dan did a great job renovating it."

Piper hadn't really heard anything past the word 'bitch'. It shocked her to hear Prue talk about their grandmother in such a callous way, even if this wasn't her own world. It was even more shocking than thinking of her grandmother as some kind of hotshot lawyer, _"Well, all that kickass had to go somewhere if we weren't demon fighting witches, I guess…"_ She thought, instantly thinking of her own situation. She looked down at her apparel and cringed. It was filled with lemon yellows, powder blues… She was even wearing a _woolly sweater_. The eldest Charmed One would give anything for a pair of her tan boots and a white business blouse in this moment.

"Can someone help me to the bathroom, please?"

Prue groaned loudly as Patty's voice floated up to them from the living room, "I don't know why you just don't put her in a home. You're not equipped to deal with a woman in a wheelchair."

"I don't put her in a home because she's our mother!" Piper suddenly blurted out, suddenly feeling protective for the feeble shadow of woman that represented her mother in this world, "You know what, never mind, I'm wasting my time here. Where does Phoebe live? And I swear…" She added as Prue opened her mouth, "If the next word out of your mouth is an insult to Phoebe, I will hit you."

"I don't know where she lives." Prue replied incredulously, as if it would be a crime if she did know, "Piper, seriously, what has gotten into you? First, you're breaking down doors, then you're protecting mom when most of the time you bitch about her, and now you want to hunt down our homewrecking tramp of a sister? What's going-?" She was cut off then Piper's fist connected with her faces, her eyes going cross eyed for a moment before she collapsed to the floor.

"Well, Fake Prue." Piper said, shaking her hand in air to try and numb the pain before she climbed over her, heading to the door, "Don't say I didn't warn you."

* * *

Pamela shook her head in annoyance as the crystals flared angrily once again, causing a pulse of energy to rip through her demonic prisoner and send him to the floor, twitching and having spasms from the electric current that had just run through his body. She never understood why demons would put up with such torture. The information they had was normally useless, and they would be killed by their superior for getting caught by a witch in the first place, so there was no point in holding out. A part of her thought they did it just to piss her off, "I'll ask you again, do you know where the Charmed Ones are?" He remained silent, curled up into a ball. Pamela bit her lip in frustration. These crystals were useless unless he talked, he just didn't know that.

"Look, dude, you're surrounded by truth crystals, which are surrounded by me and then, we'll soon be surrounded by a very worried Elder, not to mention a strung out elemental and witch who will no doubt be pissed off after searching the Underworld. If you tell me what I want to know, you can avoid being the target of all that rage."

"Fine!" He spat angrily, his teal coloured eyes glaring up at Pamela from his vantage point on the floor as he struggled to his feet, "A massive pulse of power passed through the Underworld hours ago, but it didn't stay for long. The Source sent demons after the aura trail it left behind, but…"

"The demons never came back?" Pamela finished, being validated with a nod, "Figures. But what do you mean 'passed through'? How can you pass through the Underworld? I mean, the only place that's deeper is…" A look of realization spread across her face, a rueful smile soon joining it, "Of course, the Deep Underworld… Thanks to its proximity to all the natural magic resonating from the earth's core, they're untraceable!" The witch through aloud, going over to the Book of Shadows. She began to flick through pages, but stopped just as she turned one, looking up at the demon and smiling at him, "Oh, I'm sorry, where are my manners? You've been a great help." Looking back down at the book, she casually threw out her hand, reducing the demon to pile of ash on the floor instantly, his scream echoing throughout the attic as Leo orbed in.

"Wow, you wouldn't know that you had that arm in a sling a few weeks ago." Leo said warmly, catching Pamela's smirk as she went back to looking through the book. "Did he give us anything?"

"Yeah, I think Diam and Tyola have taken them into the Deep Underworld, the only question is where." She replied, "The girls were the only ones that went down there, and they described it as hell to navigate… No pun intended, so we have no idea how to find them if we get that far, not to mention the whole place is teeming with Shadow Demons. It's like a fortress, it was a smart move."

"So, we're basically right back where we started?" Leo clarified sadly.

"Yeah… But brightside?" She closed the Book of Shadows over, tapping the silver triquetra and smiling when it let out a metallic clang against her fingernail, "If they were dead, this would have rusted away and turned into dust… Okay, maybe not, but _something_ would have happened to this book if they were dead, so at least we know they're still alive. We're gonna get them back, we always do."

"That's the reassurance you're leaving me with?" He raised an eyebrow in her direction, only getting a shrug as a response.

"After fourteen years of stuff like this constantly happening and working out fine, it should be all you need."

A large surge of water sprouted from the cracks between the floorboards, slowly taking on the shape of two people whose appearance immediately set both Leo and Pamela on edge. Brennan was holding Aidan up by keeping the elemental's arm around his shoulders, while the injured man in question struggled to stand properly. There were scorch marks in their clothes, red blotches on their faces where their skin had blistered from burns, and both of them were covered in soot and dirt, "Watch out!" Brennan shouted, "They've probably come after us!"

"Who?"

Pamela suddenly felt a wave of heat erupt to her left as Aidan's eyes widened at what he saw on the other side of the attic, "Firestarters!" He breathed.

Three cloaked beings stood across them, their faces covered by the dark hoods on their heads with the only sign of life being the wisps of smoke flowing from the depths of the fabric. It seemed to be a miracle that the cloaks hadn't burst into flames, as their hands looked like they had been carved from fragile stone, and within the many cracks in the stone, scorching hot magma glowed an angry yellow like a warning to their enemies. Smoke began to pour from their bodies as they raised their arms, the only sound being the quiet sizzle of the cloaks' fabric. Silence.

Chaos descended almost immediately. A massive explosion suddenly detonated in the middle of the room, blowing every window out of its pane before the glass itself shattered into millions of pieces. The four of them were suddenly thrown back in different directions as tiny fireballs reigned down from the explosion like shooting stars, setting fire to everything they touched. The attic was reduced to the state of a burning building within seconds.

"Leo!" Pamela shouted, shaking the lapels of her uncle's jacket in an attempt to get him to wake up from unconsciousness and save them from the inferno. He slowly began to come to, immediately noticing the Firestarter standing over them and hitting it with a pulse of lightning which flew from his hand, engulfing the demon in electricity that run all the way through his body and momentarily shocked him, giving the two of them a chance to escape.

"We need Brennan and Aidan!" Leo bellowed over the roaring fire, "You need to try and hold them off while I heal them."

"Are you _kidding_ me?" Pamela shrieked back, quickly summoning her telekinetic powers to draw some of the fire around the room towards her and into a condensed sphere in the palm of her hand. She threw her arm forward, the fireball smacking one of the Firestarters in the shoulder and sending him stumbling back, "They're resistant to everything and I think the air's become too hot to use my ice breath!"

"Then just keep doing what you just did and get rid of the fire! We need them!" With that, the Elder ran across the room, catching the attention of the two Firestarters that Pamela hadn't yet injured and was soon followed by the duo.

"Hey! Where do you think you're going?" The two beings turned back to the witch, deciding to go after her instead of Leo. Concentrating hard, she made most of the small fires that had erupted around the room leap from the thing they had set on fire and towards her hands. Her forearms began to blister from the heat coiling around them before she threw them out, a primal scream being ripped from the witch's lungs in the process as two jets of fires flew from her palms and ploughed into the two Firestarters, throwing them right across the room just from the sheer speed the flames had been traveling at.

"Damn, that hurt…" She breathed tiredly, looking down at her slightly burnt forearms. The good thing was that she had managed to get rid of most of the fire by using it as a weapon, and the attic was no longer in danger of burning down.

Leo's face had contorted into one of sheer determination as he willed his powers to work faster on Aidan. The Elder's face had gone red from the heat in the room, and he was now sweating from the mixture of heat and work going into healing. He looked up as a shadow blocked out his light, and wasn't able to move fast enough when the Firestarter suddenly clutched his throat with his volcanic hand and pulled him into the air.

The skin of his neck began to bubble and burn. He wanted to scream from the pain, but the life and air was being choked out of him. He couldn't even concentrate hard enough to orb out of the fiery being's hand. His vision was starting to cloud over from all the smoke; the pain had now disappeared, his burns worsening…

"Hey!" The Firestarter turned around at the voice, only to have a cloud of frigid ice blasted in his face. He immediately dropped Leo to the floor and let out an unearthly scream of agony as steam poured from his head. The stone hands suddenly began to slowly crumble away. The cloak, starting to lose the support of the body underneath, sagged in places before the entire being crumbled into a pile of hot dust on the floor, the black cloak now incinerated.

Pamela turned around just in time to see the two remaining Firestarters retreat in a wreath of angry flames, having suffered a casualty from their attack. "Leo, are you okay?"

"Fine…" Leo replied hoarsely, the self healing process having begun the moment he had been let go from the Firestarter's grip. He went back to healing Aidan, the superficial injuries beginning to fade. It was then he suddenly looked upwards, his eyes darting around the smoke damaged ceiling of the attic. He could have sworn…

"The Source must have found out they were sneaking around and sent his bodyguards after them. I thought Firestarters were meant to be human, but I guess an eternity as a demonic arsonist can change you…What is it?" Pamela replied wearily, finally noticing Leo's perplexed expression.

"It's… No, it's nothing."

* * *

"_Leo!_"

Piper smiled bashfully at the looks she received from passing pedestrians for hissing a name over and over again as she walked down the street. It probably didn't help matters that she was dressed like a Stepford wife while everyone around her was in suitable work apparel, all rushing to the parking lots, train stations, and bus stops to get home after an working late. Piper was usually among these people. She even recognized some of the more unique faces she would see on a daily basis by making this route, yet a part of her didn't recognize them. This part of her was even scared of this urban environment.

It was like two people were living inside of her. One was confident, successful, and a witch. The other was sheltered, attentive, and a housewife who had never seen the world. This Piper had never seen a highest reaches of the heavens, and the deepest abyss of the Underworld. This Piper had never fought bravely to be with the one she loved. This Piper had never saved the world. She had never been through the kind turmoil that would make you stronger if you overcome it.

Piper had come to accept this fact over the years, that being a witch had made her stronger. No longer did she pine for a 'normal' life. Her life _was_ normal to her. She had seen things most people hoped weren't real; she had fought to the death, losing at times, but always coming back. And despite the confusion of having two lives in her head, she knew what one she would pick, even if it was a lie and this suburban boredom was real. She would choose to fight, every single time.

Finally reaching her destination at the bottom of the hill, she looked out onto the Bay, noticing that the sky had taken on a slight pink hue, the small clouds burning in the setting sun that blinded her and made the water sparkle. This whole world had a golden hue to it. Too perfect, too beautiful. Life wasn't like this. This really was a lie.

Turning around, her suspicions were confirmed at what she saw, "Oh, someone is _definitely_ screwing with me…"

Above the large retail space, a perfectly cut slab of marble did not stand, nor did the golden letters that made up the word 'Thyme'. Instead, a giant, plastic, neon yellow 'M' stood arrogantly above the restaurant entrance, a plight to the scenery that was made up of quaint, port side restaurants, complete with a scarily realistic Ronald McDonald life-size figurine, advertising the latest meal to have 'Mc' added to the start of its name. "I need to get outta here."

She turned to stride down the street, when she noticed the headline on the sample paper that sat above the newspaper dispenser, "PHOEBE DEAN – THE LATEST IN DOOMED PARTY GIRLS?" Below it, the most unflattering picture Piper had ever seen of her sister had been blown up to nearly take up the entire front page of the trashy tabloid. It was clearly one of those pictures taken at the one weak spot most people in the public eye have, and Piper had to admit, her sister looked terrible. Finally being able to look past the picture, the eldest Halliwell sister saw the caption underneath, stating this picture had been taken while Phoebe was heading to her car outside her apartment building.

"Gotcha!"

* * *

"I have to admit, this isn't what I was expecting when you said I should come over."

Phoebe smiled as she poured wine into Brennan's glass, "Well, he's not going to be back until the morning, and this is about as public as we can get without getting caught. Besides, if he's going to hold stupid little affairs in sleazy motel rooms, I should be allowed to have something real in the comfort of my own home."

They sat at a small circular table on the penthouse's balcony, the white tablecloth billowing slightly in the soft breeze. The only things that stood on the table, however, were two glasses, and a bottle of wine, "I'm sorry about the lack of food, but I can't cook to save myself and I couldn't exactly ask the chef because she's on his payroll. I could probably make some scrambled eggs on toast if you're hungry."

Brennan laughed a little, taking a sip of his wine, "Its okay, I'm fine… Hey, why do you do that?"

"Do what?"

"You never call your husband by his name. Why is that? I mean, it's not as if you need to hide it from me, I've seen it plenty times on all the checks he's given me to fix your car." He responded with a smirk.

Phoebe shrugged slightly at the question, running her index finger around the edge of her glass and staring into her wine. "I dunno… I guess it's just easier to distance myself from him if I don't use his name. Don't get me wrong, I love you and don't regret what we're doing for a second, but a part of me still feels guilty. I mean, I _am_ married to the guy." She looked up at him with a small smile, "And, you know, I do have a daughter to think about. You and she are the good things in my life."

"What about other family?"

Phoebe snorted at this question, "I have two big sisters, one has a niece that I've never met, and the other is an insecure bitch who would rather believe her cockroach of a husband over her own sister because she's afraid of being alone." She shook her head tiredly at his bemused expression, "Long story… Basically, she thought I had went after them, although it was the other way round, and my other sister was always closer to her, so she took her side as well. I haven't seen them since." The woman let out a small sigh as she lent back in her chair, her arms folded, "Okay, so enough about me. What about your family?"

Before Brennan could answer, there was a manic knocking at the door. Both of them jumped, startled at this sharp interruption, "Stay here." Phoebe said firmly, fully prepared for what might happen if it was Jason on the other side of the door.

She wasn't fully prepared for who really was there, however, as when she opened the door; she was shocked to see her worn out older sister staring back at her, breathing heavily, "Phoebe! Thank God! I think I managed to outrun those doormen in the lobby. Listen, we have a huge problem… And the fact that you're not greeting me at all means that you have no idea who I am." Piper sighed angrily, quickly letting her hair out of the tight bun is had been swept into.

"No, I know who you are, Piper. What do you want?" Phoebe replied acidly. She had no desire to speak to the sister that had abandoned her completely out of loyalty to another without a slightest amount of proof.

"Okay, I'm just gonna hit you with this." Piper said bluntly, placing one hand on the doorframe, "I? Am not the Piper you think I am, and you? Are not the Phoebe you think you are. We're witches, and someone is using magic to screw with our heads so they can trick us into getting our powers. They already succeeded with me, so that means I have to stop you from saying the spell and get you back to normal, then we have to do the same to Paige. Are you following me so far?"

Phoebe stared blankly at her face for a few moments before replying, "You're insane." She snarled, shaking her head in contempt. She didn't even know a Paige!

"Okay… I really didn't want to have to do this." Piper grimaced slightly, before raising her hand and forcefully slapping Phoebe in the face hard enough to make her recoil slightly. "Phoebe, are you in there?" She asked hopefully, staring into her sister's shocked eyes as she held her cheek.

"What the _hell_ is the matter with you?" She shrieked, before seeing the elevator open behind Piper and reveal the two burly doormen that had been hired by the wealthy tenants of the building. "Perfect timing. Get this psycho outta here."

"No! Phoebe, wait-!" Piper was cut off by the door being slammed in her face as the doormen advanced on her. Phoebe walked back into the penthouse foyer, shaking her head with an angry sigh and massaging her jaw. Out of all the ways she had imagined seeing her family again, hearing Piper's ludicrous ramblings followed by a slap in the face was not what she had been expecting.

"Is everything okay?" Phoebe looked up to find Brennan standing nervously in the living area in front of her, looking slightly relieved at the fact she was still alone at the door.

Before she could answer, they were interrupted by the sound of small footsteps on the wooden floor. A pajama clad little girl of around four padded into the living room, rubbing her eyes with the back of her head and tiredly scratching her tousled brown hair. She stared up at Phoebe, revealing her giant, doe brown eyes, "Mommy, can you weed me a storwee? Can't sleep." She said wearily, sticking out her bottom lip and pouting, a known tactic of Chandra's when she wanted something.

"Sure, sweetie. I'll be there in just a sec, alright?" This answer satisfying her, Chandra turned around and slowly walked back down the hallway towards her bedroom, "I'm sorry." Phoebe said to her lover apologetically, giving him an anguished glance before walking down the hallway.

* * *

Piper lowered herself onto the cool front step of the building, well aware of the two doormen that were burning holes into her back with their glares. It seemed they were far too immersed in this world for the usual "Snap out of it!" tricks to work, and without her powers, Piper had no way to use any other method to convince her sister that she was telling the truth. She had no idea where Paige was, or if she was even part of this with them. Maybe she had already gotten out, maybe she had never gotten in, or maybe she was on the other side of this fake world completely oblivious to this lie. No powers, no sisters… Piper had never felt more helpless in her life, "C'mon, girls. I kinda need you here…" She whispered to herself, lowering her head to rest on her arms.

"Well, you have one of us."

Piper's head shot up and turned around to see Phoebe standing next to her, holding a bunch of papers in her hand, "I just read _aloud_ a story to my fake daughter about a princess who couldn't be with the prince until she got rid of her strange powers. Guess how she did that." The middle Charmed One said sourly, shaking her head and sitting down next to her sister.

"Is it really you?"

"Well, I should hope so. I don't wanna think of this being my real life. And if it is… Well, I'd rather go back to the dream, wouldn't you?" She said with a wry smile, before noticing that Piper was frowning at the ground with a pensive expression on her face, "What is it? What have you figured out?"

"A dream…" Piper repeated a soft tone, "The Angel's Whisper. It gains its power from the hopes and dreams of good people. What if that's what's happening? What if Diam and Tyola are using it to somehow twist our dreams together and make this fake world? If would certainly fit with what the Angel's Whisper is capable of in the wrong hands."

"But we never wanted any of this. Being a trophy wife in a loveless, adulterous marriage and…" Phoebe took a quick glance at her sister, "Being a… Martha Stewart groupie?"

"Close, but no." Piper responded dryly. "No, it makes perfect sense. Diam doesn't how to control the Angel's Whisper properly, so he's probably latched on to some tiny, fleeting thought or wish in our heads and has used it to make this world. But the thing is, that's all they are. Tiny and fleeting. Not nearly enough to build a stable and convincing world. I mean, in this world, our family wasn't a line of powerful witches, yet we still have the Manor which was built purely for a reason that only witches know. It's completely nonsensical, this isn't what I wanted. Not in a thousand years."

"What did you want?"

"To be with Leo." She replied, "And our kids. Just… taking each day as it comes, not having to worry if I or any of my family are gonna be alive next week. Free to be who we are. What about you?"

"Little things." Phoebe answered immediately, "And the big stuff too obviously, like being with Brennan and the kids, but… stuff like teaching Faith how to ride a horse, watching Brennan and Connor mess around with a baseball in front of the house while I sit on the porch. Not locked away on the top floor of an apartment building like a prisoner."

"Um… Phoebe?" Piper began in a kind tone, "You don't own a horse, and your house doesn't have a porch. What are you talking about?"

Phoebe took in a deep breath, "Well, I guess now is as good a time as any to tell you…" She looked up at her sister, "After this is all over… I'm moving away from the city, to Brennan's mom's old place up in Wisconsin."

"Hmm… I know."

"What?"

"Brennan told me last week." Piper confessed, smirking at her sister's expression, "He kinda figured that you would never pluck up the courage to tell me, so he did it himself."

"That son of a… I'm gonna kill him. That information should have come from me."

"Fair enough, but it doesn't change the fact that you want to go." She immediately looked guilty as Piper spoke, "But I want all that for you too. None of us should be tied down to this witch thing anymore. It's just too all-consuming and these days the costs far outweigh the benefits. Especially with losing that innocent a few weeks ago… But we can't stop, not until the Hollow's gone, and so are Diam and Tyola. So, we need to get out of here… but, we need find Paige first."

"Ah, I may have a solution there!" Phoebe said triumphantly, grabbing the papers she had put down at her side and bringing them onto her lap, "Thanks to this little mind meld thing we have with our fake selves, I know that Trophy Phoebe likes to snoop around Jason's office, and one day, she found this." She handed the first few pages over to Piper, who took a quick glance at them, "They're legal documents sorting out a settlement to be paid to Glenn and Paige Belland. Apparently, Jason wants to buy them out, knock down most of the stores in the area and turn it into a mall. Paige is the last hold out."

"And we have an address of the store." Piper added, quickly looking at her watch, "Eight thirty. Stores are usually still open at this time on a weekday, right?"

"Piper, we're in a fake dream world that is based entirely on seemingly unimportant thoughts and wishes, all of which has been orchestrated by our magical enemies." Phoebe arched an eyebrow, "Do you really think we can apply logical thought to _any_ of this?"

"Good point!" Piper boomed energetically, getting up from the step with her eyes still down at the address on the paper, "C'mon, we only have until midnight."

"Why midnight?"

Piper cast her gaze up to her sister, looking at her as if she was insane, "Because it's _always_ midnight."

* * *

"Give it up."

Diam glared up at Tyola as she held her hand out to help him up from the floor. He clamped his sweaty palm in hers and let her unnatural strength easily pull him to his feet. His head was pounding; he was starting to get dizzy. The being had to hold on to the empty podium just to maintain his balance. "No." He responded flatly, "We've already go two of the sisters to say the spell. All we need is for Paige to say it and we'll have succeeded. I've come too far now to throw his opportunity away."

"Oh, sure. Hold on to this opportunity and throw your life away in the process." She responded sarcastically, looking down at the three witches below her and resisting the urge to destroy them. Nevertheless, if she did that, they would have nothing, and there was no telling when another power as strong as the Power of Three would arise, "Are you absolutely sure this is the only way to get their joint power?"

"Yes." Was his firm answer. He turned back to the trio of unconscious witches on the floor and raised the Angel's Whisper up into the air once more, white light slithering from the centre and now going straight into Paige's head, the illusion having been broken for the other two sisters and the entire dream world now being sustained within the youngest Charmed One, "Two down, one to go…"

* * *

"Well, it _looks_ open…" Phoebe murmured to her older sister as they peered into the front window of the store, pretending to look at the mountain bike that was in the display in front of them. Her eyes instantly widened when she noticed Paige standing at the counter, locking up the register and heading towards the front door, "Look! There she is!" She hissed.

"Yeah, but… is she leaving?" Piper asked in a panic. Sure enough, their baby sister was soon on the sidewalk with them, locking up the front door of the store.

Paige finally looked up and jumped in fright at the two women standing at the front of her store. "Um… Did you ladies want something or are you just window shopping?"

The elder Charmed duo stood frozen, until Phoebe came up with a plan, "Uh… Yes!" She boomed brightly, stepping forward with a large smile, "See, the thing is, it's my husband's birthday tomorrow and I've simply wracking my brain for weeks trying to figure out what to get him. But, typical me, I did too much thinking and not nearly enough shopping. He's really into stuff like extreme sports, so I was wondering if you could open up for maybe fifteen minutes and let me try and find something?"

Paige sighed. She really wanted to go home, but it had been a slow business day and the money certainly wouldn't hurt, "Alright… Come on in." She groaned, unlocking the door and walking back into the store with her would be sisters in tow. "Do I know you from somewhere?" She suddenly asked, turning back to Phoebe.

A spark of hope was ignited at this, could the spell be starting to break? "Maybe." The middle Charmed One replied cryptically.

"You doing more thinking than shopping?" Piper whispered, "We _are_ in a dream world."

"Oh, shut up!"

After ten minutes of hushed brainstorming and wandering around the store, Piper and Phoebe were still none the wiser on how to make the real Paige resurface. It seemed physical violence didn't work, and seeing her sisters she only knew in her real life hadn't done anything to her. The only thing they could think of was kidnapping Paige until they figured out a plan to remedy her mind, but things could get dangerously messy if that were to happen.

Paige's cellphone suddenly went off in her purse as she stood at the counter, causing her to roll her eyes. She expected it to be a message from Glenn, asking why she wasn't home yet. Instead, it was the same odd message she had been getting all day, "Hey, I'm sorry to bother you guys, but can I ask you something?"

Piper and Phoebe exchanged a glance before answering, "Uh… Yeah, sure."

"Well, I've been getting these weird text messages all day, and I don't know they mean, so maybe you can help me out." She raised her phone so she could read aloud from the scene, "From whence they came, return them now, banish the words, banish our-,"

"It's a chain message!" Piper suddenly blurted out, sighing with relief when Paige stopped saying the spell, "Yeah, you just need to forward it to five people then completely delete it from your cell. I get them all the time. In fact, I did that one last week."

"Oh, it's one of those things!" Paige gasped, a smile appearing on her face as she immediately deleted the message, "Thanks. Just for that, I'll let you have a little more time to look around." She smiled kindly at the pair and turned to head into the back of the store before suddenly stopping, "Wait a minute…" She faced Phoebe, glaring, "I know where I know you from. You're Jason Dean's wife!" She growled, advancing on the two of them, "What did he do? Send you here to find some building code violation so we would get shut down and he could buy us out?"

"No, I-,"

"Get out."

"What?"

"Get _out_!"

* * *

"Well, that could have gone better." Piper lamented sourly, leaning back on the sidewalk bench that was across the street from Paige's store. Even this fading sunlight didn't feel the same on her face as real sunlight. Piper could only speculate that now she and her sister had been disillusioned, the stability of their joint dream world was becoming weaker and therefore less real.

"We need to use magic." Phoebe said, shaking her head, "I don't how we're going to do it, but it's our only way to snap her out of this."

Piper suddenly sat back up properly, her eyes wide, "There might actually be a way."

"How?"

"Well, think about it." She began, "The main issue with our powers has always been that they're all connected. And since the main objective of this world was to make us say the relinquishment spell, we can assume we still had our powers in some form in this world, otherwise the spell wouldn't work because there are no powers to relinquish. You following so far?"

"Barely."

"So, if we're all connected, that means we can tap into Paige's powers even we don't have our own." She calmed down considerably after this, leaning back on the bench once again, "We just have to concentrate and draw her power out, and we need to do it before she finishes ranting to the fake Glenn down her cellphone otherwise she'll drive off and we won't find her."

"Okay, so we have a plan!" Phoebe said brightly, nodding her head, "Although… one witch's magic isn't enough to snap her out of it, and it'll be even weaker after being channeled through us, so what do we do when we get her power?"

"We summon someone who _does_ have the power to snap her out of it."

* * *

Pamela slowly closed over the Book of Shadows, surveying the silent sad faces around her as she did so, "I don't know what to do." She admitted meekly, "Short of going down to the Deep Underworld and turning over every rock to find them, I don't see what else we can do." She let her arms rest on her lap, staring down at the silver triquetra. It still remained the same, which meant they were still alive, and for now, no news was good news.

"Maybe they'll get themselves out of it." Brennan suggested optimistically, dropping the fire damaged pillow he had been clinging to and throwing it to the side, "I mean, they're the Charmed Ones after all. If anyone is capable of saving themselves, it's them."

"Definitely." Leo added with a small smile, "Besides, Piper wouldn't die without this attic being clean, and having a nova blow up in the middle of room sure as hell made things messy." He said with a low chuckle, looking around the many scorch marks that now covered the attic, "And, well… this isn't how it ends. Their destiny is epic; it would be only be fitting that their end is too. And this… it's anything but important. Just to go missing… No."

Pamela nodded solemnly, before noticing that Aidan hadn't said anything, and had the nerve to be slouching on one of the sofas, his head falling backwards over the back of the couch, "Hey! Lazy boy! Your wife is missing; wanna join us in our misery here?" She snapped, throwing her pen at him. "Wake up!" She got no reaction from him, "Aidan!" Wary glances were exchanged between as they all rose to their feet to surround the elemental.

"Aidan?" Brennan frowned, clicking his fingers in front of the other man's face before lightly tapping him on the forehead, making the rest of his head completely lull back.

"If you're doing this to make us laugh, then it's not working. This isn't funny!" Pamela argued, slapping him gently in the face a few times, before hitting him properly with more force. Still no reaction. "What's going on?"

* * *

"Woah…"

Piper and Phoebe jerked in their seats and spun around to find Aidan standing behind the bench they were sitting on. "It worked." Phoebe said breathlessly, looking up at her brother in law's face and smiling. "I don't think I have ever been this happy to see you, Aidan."

"Thank God!" Piper boomed, leaning back on the bench and covering her face with her hands, letting out a wail into her palms before taking them down from her face and also smiling at Aidan. Her happiness was momentarily smothered when she saw that his clothes were covered in burn marks and it looked like he had been sweeping chimneys all day, "What happened to you?"

"Firestarters, your attic looks like a war zone, but never mind that." Aidan replied casually, shaking his head in an annoyed fashion while Piper remained in shock at his statement, "Where are we? We've been looking for you guys all day. The only comfort we've had is that the triquetra on the front of the book was still fine."

"Dream world, made out of our own wishes and twisted against us in an attempt to make us give up our powers by Diam and Tyola." Phoebe explained, "But we just used what little power we have to get you here, so enough the questions and just listen."

"Okay… why did you summon me then?"

Piper and Phoebe looked at one another before giving him a sickly smile, "You see, here's the thing." Piper began, walking towards him, "We need to make Paige snap out of the spell, because right now, she has no memory of her real life, and she's susceptible to saying the relinquishment spell without even realizing it. Now, we snapped out of it when we said the spell, because saying a spell is a pretty big link to our real lives and it sparked something in our memories-,"

"Basically, we're asking you to be Paige's pretty big link to her real life." Phoebe said flatly, earning a glare from her older sister for cutting her off, "What? You were taking too long and we're kinda on the clock." She turned back to Aidan, "All you need to do is go up to her and kiss her… We hope."

"Although it might not work straight away and she may Mace you, or slap you… Basically try to kill you actually." Piper added, trailing off quietly as she had progressed through the sentence. "Once the spell's broken, the dream world should collapse, and we'll all wake up."

"Okay. Where is she?"

They heard the slam of a door across the street. Phoebe turned around, putting her hand up to shield her eyes from the sun, which had nearly completely set below the horizon. Paige was locking up the store once again, thankfully keeping her head down to avoid being blinded by the sun as she walked towards her car. "Over there." Phoebe said robotically, raising her arm and pointing. "Go for it!"

Complying to his relative's request, Aidan jogged towards his wife, leaving Piper and Phoebe to stand on the sidewalk and watch as he caught up to her. The eldest Charmed One heaved a large sigh as Paige stopped to talk to the man who was running towards her. "I hope to God this works." She saw Aidan lean in, before everything went white.

* * *

An explosion of white hot light illuminated the antechamber, blinding Diam and Tyola, who had been used to dim lighting all day. Both of them raised their arms to shield themselves before Diam screamed and was thrown back from his position over the three girls, crashing through the podium and cracking the marble wall he collided with. The Angel's Whisper flew from his hand and skidded across the floor like a flare, emitting nothing but pure divine energy before the light suddenly died out, leaving them in the darkness once again.

"Diam!" Tyola scrambled across the room to her downed ally. From what she could see, he was barely breathing. He had used almost all of his energy from projecting into the Charmed Ones' minds, but that final blast of backfired energy had nearly killed him. It was all the magic he had put into the artifact over the entire day, and it had been turned on him.

Piper suddenly shot up into a seated position, looking around her location with wide, confused eyes, "Are we back?"

Paige groaned as she rubbed her head, before noticing that she was in her pajamas, "Well, if we're not, then this is a really weird dream…" She mused.

"Something tells me things are back to being very real!" Phoebe said urgently, springing to her feet the moment she saw Diam and Tyola at the other end of the room within the wreckage of the podium and the marble wall. "What's the matter, Diam? You don't seem as formidable as usual. Something wrong?"

Paige smirked when she noticed the Angel's Whisper on the floor, still giving off a pale glow. She picked it up by its hanger and looked into the portal that lay within it. "Well, Phoebe, using this _darling_ little contraption when you're a soulless monster can take it out of you." She said smugly, "Piper, I'm guessing that since he can't get up, and since I didn't finish the relinquishment spell, you still have the power to blow his weakened ass to smithereens."

"Great suggestion!" Piper boomed back, raising her hands and preparing to attack

"No!" Tyola bellowed, bending down to cover Diam's body before bursting into a swirl of particles that flew up into the air, vanishing into the marble dome above them and barely escaping Piper's attack, which went on to cause an explosion in the place they had inhabited, doing no damage.

"Damnit…" The eldest Charmed One growled, putting her hands on her hips and blowing air out of her nose like a dragon snorting smoke, "Well, I dunno about you girls, but I'm tired."

"Me too." Chirped Phoebe, who let her head rest on Piper's shoulder.

"Me three." Paige added, frowning slightly, "Which… is kinda weird, seeing as how we've been unconscious for nearly fifteen hours."

* * *

Paige was snapped out of her daze by the cutting honk of the car behind. She blinked a few times, before realizing that the light had turned green. Shooting an apologetic gesture in the rear view mirror, she drove off, barely being able to stay awake. The witchlighter's mind was weighed down with thoughts on the events of the day, and how, in a way, she had lived a woman's entire lifetime in just this one day.

It terrified her. Paige could remember things that had never happened to her; and a part of her felt like she had killed the woman that she had been for a day, despite it being nothing but an incredibly vivid dream. What had given her the right to completely destroy this other person, all in the name of getting back to a fight that could very possibly kill her soon anyway? She knew that she didn't have to feel this way. This person had never properly existed. It's just that her lifestyle had been so tempting.

Paige's fake life hadn't been like Piper and Phoebe's. When the spell broke on them, they could immediately see that the dream wasn't what they wanted, with both of their lives being so starkly different, but it wasn't as clear cut for Paige. In her fake world, she was happily married; she had a perfect job, and a beautiful child. It was basically her current life without the constant sorrow magic brought, and as she turned into her driveway, she realized that part of her resented her sisters for breaking the spell and destroying her blissful ignorance.

She entered the house tiredly, dropping her purse at the door. She had stayed on at Piper's with her sisters, crafting a potion that would cause fatal damage to the mortally wounded Diam, and would also hurt Tyola. Adam and Eve had come and retrieved the Angel's Whisper, telling them that it was now they had to work now more than ever. If the time was now, what had they been doing all these years?

She laughed softly when she saw Aidan sprawled out on the couch, still in the same burnt clothes he had been in all day. He had fallen asleep with his glasses on again, a frequent occurrence since they had become a permanent fixture on his face. He was sleeping on his side, so he would end up with a long, thin indent on the side of his head if she didn't intervene and take them off. She knelt down and did just that, accidentally rousing him from his sleep, "Sorry, I know you hate it when you forget to take your glasses. I thought I'd save myself the complaining tomorrow morning."

"Oh… Thanks." He answered groggily, looking around before letting his head hit the sofa again, "You're looking at me weird. What's the matter?"

It was him that made it different. With his blonde hair tousled from the awkward position he had been sleeping in, with his inquisitive emerald eyes staring up at her curiously, adjusting to sight without his glasses on before his eyelids drooped shut out of fatigue. Being with the one person she couldn't imagine life without made it different. He had given her the strength to get her perfect job, he had given her her beautiful child. Everything she had wanted had been right in front of her all along and she hadn't even seen it.

"Nothing." Paige replied, tilting her head to the side and looking into his eyes as she lovingly caressed his hair, "Hey, thanks for saving me today."

"Anytime." He replied; his voice muffled from being nearly face down on the couch, "Although I'm thinking of starting to charge you for the amount of times I do save your behind, however nice it may be."

Paige smiled back at him, moving her hand down his hand and lacing her fingers with his, "But you'll never stop being my hero, right?"

She got her hand squeezed gently as a response.

* * *

_Alright, now just click that incredibly attractive purple button at the bottom of the screen! Lol._


	39. At Journey's End

_This, you guys, is the longest chapter I have ever written, spanning 28 pages. I hope you like it, **and review it**. Lol.  
_

_This one's for __**unique-deflection**__, who without, I probably wouldn't have had the will to get through these last ten chapters. Your reviews have kept me going, dude, and it's because of you that I've reached this finale. So, thank you. And enjoy!_

**At Journey's End**

A loud honking noise pummeled Tyola's eardrums as she rematerialized, instantly being weighed down from holding Diam up next to her. The superbeing looked up, momentarily blinded by the giant headlights that were getting bigger and bigger as the massive truck approached her, trying desperately to stop before it hit her. Quickly assessing her surroundings, she decided that the empty country road was quiet enough for her to retaliate without any repercussions.

Casually raising her free arm, she focused the power she had copied from Paige a year ago, sending the truck swerving off the road with a deafening screech as the tires reacted to the sudden change in direction. It destroyed the crash barrier completely; the metal groaning is it was ripped apart from the sheer force of the weight being put upon it, allowing the truck to skid down the rest of the hill. Loud echoing screeches cut through the air as it tumbled downwards, before culminating in a large crashing noise.

Tyola turned away from the carnage she had wrought, hoping to seek shelter from her chasers in the forest that lay on the hill. Before she had even taken one step, however, a cloud of bright lights descended in front of her and deposited Phoebe and Paige in her path, "How did you-?" She was cut off when both witches suddenly threw potions at her chest. The result was a massive explosion of blue, purple, red, and orange sparks that threw both Diam and Tyola apart. She screamed as she felt the potion burn her flesh, before the being landed on the road with a thud. That was the third time this had happened tonight. She couldn't hold out much longer.

Wrenching herself into an upright position, Tyola wiped the blood away from her nose and instantly began looking for Diam. It seemed her partner had been thrown the completely opposite direction she had. He probably hadn't even felt it. The last time he had talked was when he had insisted on continuing to perpetuate the dream world he had created in the Charmed Ones' heads. "What's in those potions?" She growled as the duo advanced upon her.

"A little bit of everything we could find, and the one thing that you two seem to take damage from." Paige responded confidently, holding another vial over her enemy's head. "You wanna see again?"

Before she could drop the potion, Tyola burst into a swarm of particles that buzzed through Phoebe and Paige and headed towards Diam. He was enveloped in a cyclone of molecules before also disappearing and delving beneath the concrete.

"Damnit…" Phoebe growled, lowering the hand she had had her own vial in, "Quick. Can you trail their aura to see where they went?"

Wordlessly, a golden light covered Paige's eyes as she used her MDS. Her world suddenly became illuminated in a green hue so she could distinguish between the physical world and people's auras. Looking down at where Tyola had been sitting, she followed the smoky grey trail of light that went over to where Diam had landed, before it suddenly dove downwards and fizzled out. Her eyes returned to normal, "The aura faded away. They must have gone into the Underworld; I won't be able to track them among all the evil residue down there."

"Ah, damn." Phoebe sighed, her shoulders drooping. "I guess our tracking's done for the night then. We need to do something to stop them from going down into the Underworld otherwise we'll never stop them." She shot her sister a sympathetic smile when she began to tiredly rub her eyes, "Honey, go home and some rest. Why don't you let me and Piper try to find them for the rest of the night? With the amount of potions both of those guys have been hit with, I'm sure a scrying crystal is quick enough to track them, so go and rest those eyes of yours."

"No, I'm fine, it's alright. I'm too buzzed to sleep anyway, knowing that we're this close to getting them." The witchlighter replied vehemently, "Besides, Piper's too busy with other stuff."

"It's eleven thirty at night. What could she possibly be busy with?" Phoebe's jaw dropped at Paige's nervous expression, "Oh my God, I _knew_ she wasn't okay with me moving to Wisconsin. Is that why she's been avoiding me all week? Because if it is, I'm gonna kill Brennan. That information should have come from me. I know how to deal with her."

"Oh, come on. We both know Piper would have had the same reaction if you had given her thirty years to prepare, or if the Source himself had told her." Paige rolled her eyes before continuing, "This is just who she is, a mother hen. You're flying the coop and she just has to learn to accept that. It's not her decision to make and you shouldn't feel guilty for wanting to follow your heart."

"So you're not mad at me then?"

"Why would I be?" She rebutted, genuinely perplexed, "You're moving to a bigger, better house that has the perfect, harmless environment for my little niece and nephew. It means we'll have a great time when we all come up and visit you because of all the animals and beautiful scenery, and thanks to orbing, it doesn't matter where you go in the world because you're _still_ going to be just three seconds away." She smiled warmly at her older sister, before shrugging, "Look, you know what Piper's like. She'll be a little passive aggressive for approximately another week, then she'll go back to normal and accept it. You just have to let her work it out in her head by herself first."

Phoebe smiled shakily back at her, "You're right…" Her face twisted into a frown, "Hey, when you become the voice of reason in this family? You've always been the kooky lunatic of us all."

"It happened when everyone else's insanity surpassed mine by a mile." She smirked back, "Come on, I'll drop you off at Piper's so can just deal with all this head on." The two of them linked arms, allowing Paige to carry them away in a cloud of light.

* * *

It was at times like this you couldn't allow yourself to get mad. From Pamela's experience, getting mad significantly increased her body temperature. And on a particularly humid New York night where people slept on top of the covers on their beds, the last thing she needed was more heat.

However, she was finding it an increasingly difficult chore to keep her temper under wraps when she had had to listen to Joanna screaming her lungs out for the past hour. She had heard the muffled voices of Dean and Gwen discussing tactics to calm their child, and sometimes just trying to make sure that the other didn't go insane. They had asked Pamela not to get up from bed in situations like this, as they wanted to learn how to deal with everyday baby problems by themselves. At this moment, Pamela had no problem with this for two reasons, the first being that such a tiny thing making such a horrible noise terrified her, and the second was that she didn't know if she could control herself from doing something drastic if she came into contact with her niece.

Removing the pillow that had been sitting on her face, Pamela blew into the air and unleashed a cloud of frigid cryokinetic mist from her lungs. She couldn't see it in the darkness of her room, but she certainly felt it when it descended on her, cooling her heated skin. This effect was temporary though, and short of completely depleting her energy and turning her room into a freezer, it was all she could do.

Silence. Pamela froze. Had Joanna finally gone to sleep? After a few seconds of the blissful calm, she let a smile crack across her face before the crying started up again. Pamela screamed into her pillow, not caring when she suddenly felt uncomfortable from the rise in heat. Her niece didn't even try to hide the fact she was part demon with all this crying. "I can't believe I took this over London…" She whispered to herself, looking over at her clock and seeing it was nearly three in the morning. She suddenly found herself wondering what time it was in London, and what Keith was doing at this very moment. Probably not struggling to sleep through unbearable heat and a positively demon child screaming her lungs out.

Her way of life was beginning to tire her. Constantly putting herself on the line in fights that weren't hers to be fought, sacrificing her happiness out of obligation to family. She knew she couldn't blame others completely. She was to blame also, for while she may constantly act like nothing fazed her, the truth was that large changes terrified her. She couldn't imagine not seeing family members regularly, not waking up in the same place every morning. That fear was debilitating, but it was also what would spur her on.

Pamela Walker would travel, she decided. She would throw her responsibilities to the wind, find her own happiness and clutch it with both hands, broaden her horizons, see different cultures, experience complete elation and total sadness. She wanted it all, and was sick of putting it on hold because of other people and her own fears.

The baby stopped crying. There was silence in her head now.

* * *

Tyola paced back and forth in the dark chamber, glaring at the one torch that was perched in a holder on the wall. She found herself mesmerized momentarily by the dancing flames before shaking herself out of her trance and turning on the demon that was holding his hands above Diam, rays of purple light flooding from his palms and into the being that lay on the plinth before him. "Well, what's your prognosis? What have you found out?"

The demon gave her a grave look, lowering his hands and taking the purple light away. "Nothing good, I'm afraid. I'm surprised your friend still has a physical form with the amount of magic he has left. He should be a nothing but a faint essence by now." He said with a hint of triumphant pity to Diam, who had once been the object of fear for centuries.

"What do you mean? How would the amount of magic he has affect his body?" She spat angrily, advancing on the demonic healer and demanding an answer.

"You… really don't know?"

"Know what?"

"Oh, man…" The evil being scratched the back of his head, cringing slightly and suddenly becoming extremely uncomfortable, "The two of you… Well, you were made out of the dregs of magic. When the Hollow fought against the magical community all those centuries ago, it would absorb all the magic that still lingered in the air on the desolate battlefield and use it. You two weren't the first servants either, there were three before you, but there are hardly any records of them. Probably just prototypes-,"

"Get to the point!"

"Anyway," The demon continued shakily, Tyola now close enough so he could see the indignation and impatience in her eyes. She could probably rip his throat out so fast that he would still be alive to see it in her hand before dying, "That's how you were created. The dead magic that went to waste during the war. You two are made up of pure magic, and if you lose too much of that magic, you die. The same thing that happened to your friend is what's happening to you with those potions the witches keep throwing at you. They're destroying a big chunk of your magic each time. That's why it hurts so much when you get hit. He used too much magic doing something and now he's paying the price."

"We're nothing but dead magic…?" Tyola asked quietly, looking over to Diam's face. She hadn't really noticed it before now, but in the poor light of the cavern, it was as if her partner of three and half millennia was beginning to fade away. Every shadow on his face seemed bigger and darker, he was paler, and had been barely breathing for last few days. Things truly were over, "You," She growled, turning to the demon next to her, "You've read both of us with your abilities. How long would it take for us to soak up enough natural magic to match the Power of Three?"

"Centuries. He's nearly dead and you're no prize yourself."

Ignoring the comment that would normally warrant a maiming, she continued, "Alright, how many demons could I have to kill and absorb so we could match the Power of Three?"

"Hundreds. Maybe a few thousand, but you need to know that you no longer have what it takes to take the Charmed Ones head on in a fight. With each of their personal powers, not to mention their collective power, they would finally vanquish you."

Tyola smirked cockily, "I'm not looking to go up against them." She admitted, grabbing Diam's arm and pulling him to his feet, supporting him once again, "You have been a great asset in helping us navigate this world in these last two years. The Hollow was sure to reward you once the zero world had come to fruition."

The demon was about to bow to her, before frowning and noticing her wording, "'Was'?"

"Apologies…" She said softly, before hurling out her arm and quickly dispatching the healer with a sizzling, bright neon energy ball. He screamed for mercy as flames consumed him, before he exploded into a cloud of ash that fell to the floor, leaving nothing a wisp of smoke and the echo of his sobs. Tyola took a sharp intake of breath as his life force and powers entered her and Diam, sighing heavily, "…I have to start somewhere…"

* * *

"Well, that was disgusting." Aidan deadpanned, holding the towel tightly against his left palm to stop it the large, deep cut from bleeding all over Piper's rug, which had been explicit about, not about the fact that her brother in law was willingly giving her and he sisters a lot of his blood. "Is that going to be enough to make one big final batch? Because I really don't want to keep doing that." He asked weakly, his face going slightly pale from seeing a large amount of his blood in the bottom of the jar it had been milked into.

Paige held the jar up to her eye level, narrowing her eyes at it curiously before they suddenly went golden. Using her MDS, she smirked when she could see the tiny globes of aquamarine light bouncing around in the blood her husband had just donated. "This is perfect. Thank you, honey." She gave him a small kiss on the cheek before she picked up the athame he had cut himself with and began to scrape the remaining blood of it and into the jar, repulsing the elemental in the process, "Oh, what?" She snapped playfully, seeing his horrified expression, "I'm just making sure we don't waste a drop."

"Anymore blood stains on my rug?" Piper asked darkly as Paige took the towel away from Aidan's hand so she could heal the cut.

"No." The elemental replied dutifully like a child who had been scolded for past behaviour. "Hey, you're technically an elemental in place of Lorna. Why don't I see you giving over a pint or two? Or the rest of the elementals." He questioned her suspiciously, feeling that he shouldn't have to bear this burden alone when there were other beings who could contribute.

"Well, I'm a Charmed One, so we can't take the chance that my blood would contaminate the potion. The Sylph are wind spirits, so they don't bleed, and Max? Well… You're just closer." She gave him an amused smirk, "Besides, it doesn't matter what elemental we get the blood from. We all share the common internal power that comes with the title." Noticing that he still seemed to be uncomfortable, she tried to console him, dropping the mask of humour, "Look, Aidan, it was your kind that sealed Diam and Tyola away all those centuries ago, meaning they must have some kind of weakness to you. The potion with your blood in it is the only thing that's hurt them so far, so don't cop out on us now."

"I'm not, and I would never." Aidan replied passionately, "I just wanted an explanation."

"And speaking of explanations…" Paige started nervously, gazing over to Piper, "Did you speak to Phoebe at all last night when you trying to find Diam and Tyola?"

"Yes. I asked her to pass the scrying crystal and she did."

"Piper…"

"Oh, what?" She replied angrily, shaking her head, "I may have been okay with it in that dream world, but when we returned to reality I saw things a whole lot clearer. We don't function well when we're apart, and we've learned thanks to some brutal lessons over the years."

"Are you kidding me?" Paige argued back, "She left us for nearly two years. She met a guy, married him and got a kid and while she was doing that, we were getting on with our hectic lives perfectly fine. That's crap argument and you know it."

"No, it's not, because back then, we lived together along with Emma and Pamela, and not to mention there were a lot less defenseless children to protect back then."

The youngest Charmed One sniggered slightly at this, "Our children have never been defenseless. Given the chance they could probably kick our asses ten times over without breaking a sweat… Piper, the say I see it, you have two choices here. You can either accept this and let Phoebe leave on good terms, or you can stay mad for no reason and probably end up losing contact with her. But either way, she's leaving, and you can't stop that. I mean, you and Leo decided that he was going to become a mortal after we vanquished the Hollow. Did you bother to consult Phoebe and I when you decided to destroy our main healer?"

"That was different." Piper snapped, folding her arms and looking at the floor, mumbling the rest of her statement, "That had nothing to do with you two."

"… Just like Phoebe deciding where she wants to live has nothing to do with the two of us." Paige pointed out calmly, taking a drop of Aidan's blood from the jar and putting it into the bubbling potion in front of her, "This battle signifies a lot. And win or lose, everything is going to change afterwards. It's better to prepare yourself for the changes you know are coming, rather than denying them and getting it full force by them when the time comes."

"Yeah," Piper retorted in a cynical tone, "But there's always one thing that won't change…" Her gaze suddenly went over Paige's shoulder, her eyes widening in fright, "Demons!"

Despite Piper's wording, Paige turned around to find one incorporeal demon standing behind them, the Book of Shadows and its altar clearly visible through him. He was dressed head to toe in a fitted black coat that went all the way down to his feet, his eye's a dark coal black to match with his outfit, "I'm not here to fight." He said, his voice echoing through the attic.

Piper lowered her hands from their attacking position, eyeing the demon with measured skepticism, "What are you here for then?"

"To send a message." He replied monotonously, "The Source requests your presence in the Dead Star immediately. Summon your other sister and I will take you there."

"You want us to follow you, a demon, to a place called the Dead Star?" The eldest Charmed One remained fiery, glaring at the demon and still trying to see if he was a trick or not, "We're not just going to follow you blindly."

"Very well, but either way, I'm not leaving until you three are coming with me."

"How do we know that we can trust you?" Paige asked stonily, taking a similar stance as her sister and tightly folding her arms.

At this, the demon let a smirk slide onto his face, "You don't."

* * *

"We've willingly waltzed into some pretty deep crap over the years, but I think this may just beat it all." Phoebe paced nervously on the dusty red ground, making sure that she didn't trip again where the intersecting lines of a pentagram had been carved into the ground, "You don't think that they lead us here to try and trap us, do you?" She asked worriedly, her eyes darting back and forth between her two sisters who shared similar casual poses, Piper with her hands in her pockets and Paige sitting on the ground.

"Phoebe, would you please just relax?" Piper snapped, tired of her sister's paranoid ranting, "We have the Source vanquishing spell if things get ugly, and we're more than capable of fighting our way out."

"What do you think he wants?" Paige mused out loud, not looking up from the marks she was fingering out in the dirt, "He wouldn't invite us here just to kill us. That's way too polite for a Source." She said sarcastically, continuing to make marks in the sand.

"True, I guess we'll just have to wait and see."

It was as if Piper got her wish. All of a sudden, flames, shimmers, and smoke began to appear around the pentagram, revealing an entire horde of demons that were holding torches to give the cave some light, their expressionless faces being illuminated to reveal the various tattoos, skin colours, eye colours, scales, and armour that adorned each of the evil beings. Phoebe could have sworn that she also a few tails also. It seemed like every single type of demon served this new Source, and although they couldn't see them, the Charmed Ones could hear the various transportations methods of other demons as they came in behind the immediate ring that stood around the circular perimeter of the pentagram.

Towards the largest entrance of the cave, the swarm of demons parted like the Red Sea, creating a clear path and turning to one another so that they faced this path. Small glimmers of light flew all over the room, thanks to the torch light catching the shiny, armoured hands of the tall creature that was advancing towards them, making his way into the pentagram. A cloak completely covered his body, and the dirt on the ground around him was disturbed by whatever magic that was making him float instead of walk. A giant, ceremonial helm sat on his head, almost doubling as a crown with a number of large, sharp spikes jutting out of it like swords. The place where his face should have been was completely open, but all that could be seen was a howling, black abyss. All three witches silently decided that they would rather not find out whether or not this was just because of the poor lighting.

"Surrounding us with demons isn't exactly the best way to gain our trust." Piper spat, relieved to see Phoebe and Paige standing at her sides through her peripherals. She found herself craning towards a little just to look at the place where the demon's face was meant to be.

"They won't hurt you." The Source replied, his deep and magniloquent voice thrumming with darkness and power, "Or, to be more precise, they _can't_."

He crossed into the pentagram and instantly dropped from his floating stance and onto his feet. Without another word, the evil being raised his hand, signaling to the inner circle of demons to suddenly conjure fireballs, lightning bolts, anything that they could cause damage with. He then rolled his hand into a fist, which caused his minions to release their weapons and hurl them at the Charmed Ones. All three witches watched in horror as the attacks came sailing towards them, before breathing a sigh of relief when they all seemed to vanish the moment they crossed into the pentagram.

"The Dead Star was created eons ago for summits such as this." The Source explained, moving towards the centre of the pentagram and closer to the Charmed Ones, "No magic exists or can exist within this pentagram, and it allows only one ambassador for each side within it. While there are three of you, your collective power makes you count as one."

"Fascinating. Why did you ask to meet us?" Piper replied stonily, trying to hide the fact that she had been scared out of her wits.

"To discuss our mutual interests."

"And those would be?"

"The growing threat of the Hollow; and its servants." The Source replied, slowly walking closer to the Charmed Ones, "In a bid for more power to use against you, they started a wave of vanquishes a few hours ago, draining demons of their life force and powers to meet their own ends. The group that stands around you now is what's left of the Underworld and its dwellers." He let out a sigh, which sounded more like a gust of chilling wind, "I'm told that you have discovered their weakness and have harnessed it in a potion…"

"Oh, so this is a shakedown for a potion ingredient?" Paige asked sharply, cutting him off, "If that's the case then we'll leave right now, we're not about to stick around for a giant demon in a gimp mask trying to kill us." She growled, instantly getting defensive as the secret ingredient was currently running through her husband's veins.

"I have no interest in fighting you." The Source replied strongly, turning to Paige and sensing her anger boiling beneath the surface, "I am merely asking you to share your wisdom so that we may survive against this massacre."

"And why would we do that?" Piper droned, scoffing at the tall demon, "It would give me so much joy to see every single demon in this room get vanquished. Our lives would certainly become a lot less complicated."

"Your lives still stand to be less complicated if you divulge your secret."

"And how's that?"

"Bargaining." The Source explained, stopping mid-pace and retuning to the centre of the pentagram to stand in front of Piper. "If you tell us how to inflict damage upon these creatures, the Underworld shall grant you immunity. No demon would ever come after you as long as you live, and if a demonically troubled innocent came under your protection, they too would be granted immunity. We would not be asking you to ignore your duties. In fact, this makes them easier to do, as long as you tell us what the potion's main ingredient is." Seeing their genuine confliction over his proposition, the powerful demon decided to give them some space, "Of course, you will need to talk this over. But be swift, time is of the essence." With a respectful bow that put him at Paige's height, he turned and walked away, presumably to talk with his strongest allies.

The three sisters huddled around, none of them speaking. They couldn't think of what to say. Never had such a tempting offer being put to them before. Nothing was being sacrificed, innocents who they came across would still be protected, and the Source had said nothing about them having to leave the demons alone. If they wanted, they could vanquish demons without any danger at all. "We can't put Aidan in danger." Paige finally said, shaking her head vigorously, "It's too risky. If we tell them, then he'll have a swarm of demons attacking him instantly."

"I agree." Phoebe said halfheartedly, along with a small nod from Piper, "But I'm not sure if this Source would try something like that. I think he knows he hasn't gained enough power from his position yet to take us on, and attacking your husband would certainly make us react."

"Plus, if the demons have the potions, they can drive Tyola out of the Underworld and send her right back up to us." Piper pointed out excitedly, "She'll be screwed no matter where she goes and we can vanquish her. And, to be honest… What they're offering is probably the most seductive offer I've ever heard."

"Tell me about it…" Paige said ruefully, before squeezing her eyes shut and strengthening her resolve, "But I just can't put Aidan directly in the firing line, you guys. If it was anything else, then I would have agreed to the deal without even having to discuss it, but… he's the one person I can't live without. What if it was Leo or Brennan who was in this position?"

Piper and Phoebe shared a look, before remembering their current feud and turning away from one another. Their little sister was right, and was selfish of them to expect her just to put her husband in danger for the chance that the demon may be telling the truth. "… I say we tell him." Phoebe said, earning shocked expressions from her siblings, "Listen to me, I don't think he'll attack Aidan to any of the other elementals. Him wanting to meet us seems to suggest that he'd rather collaborate than make enemies right now. Besides, we can protect Aidan from any demon, not to mention he's pretty good in a fight himself." She reasoned, "Paige, you know that we won't let anything bad to Aidan, but this could be our one chance to finally vanquish Diam and Tyola, and put this whole thing behind us."

Paige let out a sigh small sigh, pursing her lips as she thought the proposition over, "Alright… But we get out of here the moment the deal is made to make sure he's okay, got it?" She got two sharp nods from her sisters, before the three of them turned around to face the Source.

"We'll tell you the ingredient." Piper said firmly, "But we need a little insurance that you'll keep your word and your deal after we tell you. What can you do about that?"

"This is another reason why I asked to meet you within the Dead Star. It ensures the integrity of what its inhabitants say." The Source replied, walking back towards the Charmed Ones and away from his servants. "The moment you tell me the ingredient, the deal shall be held until the end of all of our lives, and if either of us go back on the deal, we'll be forced to live the rest of our lives within this pentagram. And seeing as how I am the only one who will have to offer a long term condition, it is only I who is in danger."

Piper had to commend the demon for his intellect in thinking this through; making sure that the offer would be irresistible to the three of them. But she had to be wary of it also, as it could lead to her being tricked, "… The blood of an elemental." She sighed, a part of her immediately regretting her words as she spoke, "That's the secret ingredient. Put it into a level nine offensive concoction and you've got the potion. But I'm warning you, if you come after my brother in law or any other of the elementals, I'll-,"

"That won't be necessary." The Source cut her off, "Just as your side as the elementals of earth, wind, fire, and water, our side holds their demonic counterparts." He chuckled lowly at their surprise, sending chills down their spine, "Elementals are all about balance. As there elementals on the side of good, there must also be elementals on the side of evil. No harm will befall anyone on your side. Mefis!" He suddenly bellowed, causing one of the demons he had been talking to earlier to take a step forward and bow, "Find the demonic elementals and bleed them _dry_."

"What?" Piper suddenly exclaimed, her eyebrows shooting up, "Won't that upset the balance extremely?"

"While both sides may hold elementals, the manner of their conception is vastly different." The giant creature explained, "You have to hunt for a successor, we merely must find a strong enough demon to not be driven insane and to suicide by the powers." He took in a large breath, suddenly causing the witches to feel a little out of sorts from sheer power of his inhale, "And so, Charmed Ones, your demon battling days are over… I cannot wait for the day when your children come of age."

Realization hit the Wiccan trio as their hearts sank, "What do you mean? You said you would leave us alone!" Phoebe shouted through gritted teeth, trying to contain her anger.

"Yes, exactly. We would leave _you_ alone, not your children. And since they are far from being regular innocents, the other part of our deal won't protect them either. But I wouldn't worry." He oozed in a terrifying tone, "We have years of repairs ahead of us before we're ready to take on your family, but when we do…" His speech melted into maniacal laughter as he turned away and walked out of the pentagram, instantly resuming his levitation before vanishing in a large surge of vicious red flames. His exit prompted the other demons to leave also, all of them disappearing in their various methods of transportation and causing silence to descend upon the Charmed Ones.

"Why do we _always_ get screwed by the wording?"

* * *

"So… you now have eternal demonic immunity?"

"Yes."

"And I don't?"

"…Correct."

"And the kids don't either?"

Piper was rendered silent by this final question and looked down at the floor, "Pam…" She run a hand through her long hair and resented her sisters for staying silent on the attic sofa as she tried to explain herself, "You know that I wouldn't have agreed to anything unless I thought the entire family was going to be safe. He just…" Her hands tightened into angry fists, "He caught me out with the wording and by the time I realized it was too late to do anything. But hey! Phoebe and Paige were there too and they didn't notice!"

"Hey!" The two younger Charmed Ones protested in unison, before going back to their meek silence due to Piper being completely right.

"It's okay, you guys." Pamela sighed sadly, continuing to swing the garnet crystal over the map in front of her, "I know you wouldn't have done it intentionally. Besides, I'm getting a couple years off, right?"

"Yeah…" Piper replied quietly, casting her gaze back to the floor.

"I don't think you should worry about it too much, Pam." Phoebe offered with small smile, "I seriously doubt that any demon would have the guts to go up against you these days, now that your powers are back to full strength."

"Except from the Source. By the sounds of things I'll be the first on his hit list…" Pamela retorted, her jaw clenched and her eyes following the crystal. She couldn't look at them. She knew that hadn't intentionally threw her under the proverbial bus, but they had, and it wouldn't be them that would have to deal with the fallout.

"You'll be ready for him." Paige replied passionately, "I can promise you that."

"I hope so…"

Growing footsteps interrupted the four witches as Brennan walked into the attic, his arms full of jars that contained more potion ingredients that had been brought from the kitchen, and some that hadn't. "Okay, I'm pretty sure I pissed off a few demons in the market when I took the black Manticore scales, but apart from that, we got everything you guys needed." He said, prettying it all down on the table that was in front of him.

"Where are Leo and Aidan?" Piper frowned, knowing that all three men had gone to the demonic market to get supplies for the final batch of vanquishing potions.

"Uh… Leo was looking at some of the mail that was on the table in the foyer, and I'm pretty sure Aidan's too scared to come up here in case you guys decide to cut him again." Brennan replied, smirking a little.

"Leo was looking at the mail?" Piper said, her eyes lighting up.

"Yeah, downstairs."

"I'll be right back." Piper said lowly in an excited tone, rushing out of the attic and almost running down the stairs.

"Alright!" Paige suddenly boomed, flying off the sofa and towards the potion table, "I want you guys to always be at least five feet away from this table. If I make one mistake, I could blow the house up." She said, beginning to carefully measure out ingredients at an obsessive level."

Phoebe raised an eyebrow, "If the whole house blows up, how will standing back a few feet help?"

Paige let out a hollow laugh before it ended with a smirk, "It's the difference between possibly getting killed, and definitely getting vaporized."

They all stepped back.

* * *

In her rush to get to the bottom floor of the house, Piper nearly missed her husband in their bedroom, lying spread eagled on the bed and bathing in the sunlight, a sheet of folded paper in his hand. Seeing this, she immediately halted and walked briskly into her room, her eyes dazzling, "Well?" She asked, rubbing her hands together as Leo sat up, his face stricken with sadness, "Oh, honey. I'm sure it's not that bad…"

Leo gave her a baleful look, before breaking out into a beaming grin, "Damn right it's not bad!" He exclaimed cheerfully, hurriedly unfolding the piece of paper again and holding it up to Piper's face, "I got an A!" The Elder boomed, causing Piper to let out an uncharacteristic squeal of elation as she jumped into his arms, knowing that her husband was beaming over her shoulder. "I am now a certified carpenter, so if someone asks for my credentials, I can shove this right back in their faces!"

"Good!" Piper replied appreciatively, "This means you can now charge Mrs. Noble for retiling her roof a couple of months ago…" The witch's eyes narrowed with anger. If her husband wasn't such a nice person to everyone, he would have told their intrusive and annoying neighbour to go and pay someone with lesser talents than him to redo her roof, but Leo's guilt got the better of him and he did back breaking labour for nothing.

"But it means more than that, right?" Leo retorted, a twinkle in his eyes, "The moment you defeat the Hollow, I become human. I sorted out the final details with the other Elders today, and they said that if we won the battle, they would take my powers from me when it's all over. Looks like we can grow old together like we always wanted…"

Piper smiled at him, running a hand over his face. She had appreciated Leo gradually altering his appearance over the years so it seemed like he aged along with her, but nothing could replace going through the process first hand. "We should go on vacation when all this is over." She suddenly blurted out, not even realizing what she had said and broadening her smile when her head caught up with her mouth.

"What?"

"A vacation." She repeated, before her eyes widened, "Our honeymoon! We've been married for more than _eleven_ years and we have never had our honeymoon! Italy!" she was now just shouting out anything that popped into her head, "Oh, we need to go to Italy. There's amazing history, beautiful art, breathtaking architecture, and _exquisite_ food! Just think of all the inspiration I could get for Thyme!"

Leo laughed at this, "I would say that you were getting ahead or yourself, but then I think of how much time there's left until we can do all this… And you're really not." He stared into her eyes, smiling sagely, "I can't wait."

"Neither can I." She replied, leaning in and crashing her lips against his, slowly pushing him back on the bed.

"Hey, Piper! We need to-! Whoa! Close the door next time!" Pamela spun on her heel immediately as she entered the room, going back into the hallway with her hands over her eyes and cringing.

"Oh, please!" Piper fumed, clambering off her husband and standing up, "We're both still fully clothed!"

"I mean, there are _children_ in the-!"

"What do you _want_, Pam?"

"Oh…" The witch brought her hands away from her face and turned around, placing one of her now free hands on the doorway, "You kinda need to get going. I found them."

* * *

Tyola let out a roar of agony as she collapsed to her knees on the hard marble floor of Magic School. Diam fell completely from her grasp, tumbling gracelessly to the floor with a thud as she let go of him so she could use her arms to prop herself up. She was on all fours, smoke still rising from her body from where she had been struck with the potions. How the demons had got hold of the potion wasn't even her main concern. None of that mattered anymore. They would all be dead soon. "I didn't see it ending like this, Diam." She said gravely, knowing that her comrade was too far gone to even hear her. "But in the end, we'll still win. Just not in the way we planned."

With those final words, Tyola pushed herself up to her knees and threw her arms out to her sides; using the energy she had gained from many demons she had killed to power her telekinetic abilities. Every object flew away from the centre of the Great Hall, regardless of its weight. Chairs, desks, large pieces of rubble. Everything was removed from the middle of the large room, revealing a worn hexagram on the floor, beautifully intricate and complicated, "And to think, I laughed when you drew this…" She chuckled, before shakily wrenching herself into a standing position and pulling Diam into the middle of the hexagram with what little physical strength she had left from the numerous attacks she had suffered. The Charmed Ones would be here soon, but it would be too late.

Tyola held her arms out once more, but this time in front of her. Wisps of silver energy slithered from her palms and joined together at the edge of the hexagram, culminating in a powerful flash of blinding light, leaving the Hollow sitting in its place. It had always fascinated Tyola to think of her master being forever sealed into such a small prison, but despite its appearance, it had done its job without a hitch for three thousand, five hundred years. Until now.

Gripping onto Diam's forearm, she began to chant just above a whisper, her hair shifting slightly in the supernatural wind her spell was starting to concoct. Every ancient symbol within the hexagram came to life, along with the hexagram itself, in a sudden explosion of golden light. The outer ring of the drawing suddenly began to spin, as if it were a physical object. The shimmering energy around the two beings became stronger and almost removed them from sight. Tyola's eyes flashed open and she stopped chanting, her mouth twisting into a miserable yet triumphant smirk, "You're too late."

She slowly turned her head to see the Charmed Ones staring at her through the cloud of powerful light, barely able to make out their faces as they reeled their arms back and threw the potions into the maelstrom of energy the hexagram was causing. Tyola felt the three blows land in her back, each causing an excruciating detonation. They destroyed what was left of her body and caused her to explode in a shower of sparks and ash, becoming part of the flowing energy that swirled around Diam's body, which was starting into disintegrate into a spray of golden particles and also joining the powerful light.

"What's happening?" Paige shouted over the thrumming of the power, "What did she do?"

Her question was answered as the energy suddenly shot upwards into a concentrated point above the Charmed Ones' heads, becoming a sphere of white hot light that then flew through the air, quickly descending and colliding with the Hollow dead on. Silence. "Oh my God…" Phoebe breathed, seeing the symbols that the hexagram had been drawn with, "It's a hexagram that's used for sacrificial offerings! The bitch pushed the self-destruct button on both of them!"

"Well, _that's_ not fair, not to mention cheating!" Piper shrieked incredulously.

"You _think_?"

"Uh… guys? Can you stop being passive-aggressive about your personal issues for one minute and look at what's happening?" Paige snapped, making her sisters' turn away from one another focus their attention on their imprisoned nemesis.

The box still glowed with a golden light as it began to shake. The patterned jewels, which had presumably been part of the binding ritual all those millennia ago, started to fall off the black container like they had been stuck on with cheap glue. Energy was bursting from within it, completely blowing off the latch and causing the lid to fly open. All three witches raised their arms to their eyes, shielding themselves from the harsh light that consumed them.

* * *

"…Where are we?"

"I dunno, but if anyone says the Kansas line, I'm gonna blast you into next week."

It took their eyes a few seconds to adjust to the drastic changes in light. The first thing that took their attention was the sky. It seemed like it was in the middle of twilight, with the bottom of the sky a mass of reds, pinks and oranges that gradually faded away the higher they went, turning into a deepening blue that stretched upwards into infinity. Trees were all around, the canopy of leaves enveloping all three of them in darkness. But it wasn't the darkness that intrigued the Charmed Ones; it was the cold, midnight blue that the trees seemed to be, rather than a healthy brown colour. Looking up to the mouth of the forest where there it was slightly lighter, they could see the leaves hanging from the trees were also a frosty navy; and not one of them was moving, despite the small breeze.

"Silence." Phoebe mused out loud, gathering her sister's attention, "When have you ever heard a forest this quiet?"

Piper shrugged, "I dunno, but then again, you're moving to where there's a lot of forest area, so I guess you would be the expert."

Phoebe, exasperated, rolled her eyes tiredly, "We have absolutely no idea where we are. Do you really want to bring this up _now_?"

"Yeah. Really, do you?"

The three witches jumped at the voice, turning back to the mouth of the forest to see the silhouette of a rather tall woman. "Relax…" She said, trudging towards them on the frosty ground and revealing herself to be Katrina as she got closer. The higher being smiled politely at the trio when she reached them, "Questions later." She stated, "For now, follow me." She said simply, turning around once again and going back the way she came.

Complying with her request, the Charmed Ones began to walk after her, noticing the small slope they had to go up to reach the edge of the forest. "Where the hell are we?" Piper asked abruptly, catching up to Katrina and walking along side her.

"Didn't I just say that questions were for later?" Katrina retorted, irritated, "The only things you need to know right now is that you're all still alive, and the Hollow is still in its box."

"What are you talking about? We saw the Hollow break out." Paige argued, also picking up her speed to match with the higher being's larger strides, "You know, gems falling off, latch breaking, light everywhere. All the signs of a magical prison break."

"Stop asking…!" She trailed off as they reached the edge of the dark forest, now able to see what stretched before them, "Okay, now you can ask questions."

They stood before a massive mountain, their way towards it apparently paved with smaller plateaus all around. It glowed with an unnatural aquamarine hue with the near night sky, causing the Charmed Ones to shiver from the foreboding feeling that they got from it. The four of them began to walk down into the valley-like area, and it was now they could see the horror of what lay in front of them. In each of the large masses of rock, people seemed to be stuck as if cement had been poured on parts of them. Some had tribal markings on their backs, some had red skin, some had wings, some even had horns, but despite all the different angles, their eyes were always covered. All of them, suspended in some kind of movement. It was like an abstract painting; only this came off more as a massacre than art.

"Wh… What the hell is all this?" Phoebe breathed, terrified by what she was seeing. She looked down, just managing to step out of the way of what looked like a demon encased in the ground, his bat like wings sticking out of the ground slightly.

"Thousands of angels, thousands of demons. All of them, bound into stone." Katrina said solemnly, finally stopping in her march, "I'd like you to meet my colleagues." She said, presenting the two men that were walking towards them, "This is Vondar, and this is Insigil, the only two beings in this world that can rival my power."

"It's a pleasure to meet you," Insigil said calmly, bowing slowly while Vondar stayed silent, a look on contempt on his face.

"Not likewise." Piper responded impatiently, folding her arms and surveying the trio of superpowered entities that stood before them as if they were lying children, "Okay, what the hell is all this, and why did you bring us here?"

"This place has many names." Insigil responded sagely, looking up to the twilight sky which the Charmed Ones guessed was perpetual, "In some magical cultures, it's called Journey's End, in others its called The Scar. It was never given a name, partly to hide it from its enemies, and the other part… Well, how do you describe a place like this in a few words?" He asked, raising his arms and making the three witches look around at the trapped beings within all the rock, as if they had just been carved out of stone. "It's on a completely different plane from anything else in this universe."

"And it was extremely difficult to bring into being" Vondar added darkly, "Creating a place like this took a tremendous amount of our power, but we've managed to regain it over the thousands of years that we have lived."

"Wait a minute… you guys created this… cemetery?" Phoebe asked incredulously, not able to think of another way to describe what she was seeing, "Does that mean that-?"

"Relax, Phoebe. We're not going to turn you into stone." Katrina said casually, "And nor did we bind all these creatures into the stone, at least not without their consent."

"What are you talking about?"

Katrina pursed her lips as she gathered all the information in her head before speaking, "This place isn't a cemetery. In a way, all the angels, demons, and humans are still alive. The stone prevents their bodies from decomposing and therefore their souls remain intact. It's a half life, but a life nonetheless." She walked towards one of the larger mounds of rock and placed her hand against it. Immediately, all the beings that were encased began to glow, orbs rushing from them as strangled wailing broke the calm, "It's a spell." She said quietly, her eyes closing and flickering, "A massive spell. Probably the biggest gathering of magical power to ever exist in the universe. The power of thousands of souls…" The higher being smiled a little, pulling her hand away and making all the orbs fly back into the stone, "To this day, they chant."

"I knew this place reminded me of the afterlife…" Paige murmured to herself, her eyes following the few remaining orbs as they flew back into the plinth, the faded screaming ceasing the moment they vanished.

"When the Hollow first came to be three and a half millennia ago, magic fought back with everything they had, only to be beaten during every conflict." Katrina explained, stepping back from the stone she had touched, "Everything that lived had been decimated in its wake. This realm was originally built to hide from the Hollow, but after it swallowed a few dimensions, we realized it wouldn't work like that."

"We managed to write a binding spell that would confine the Hollow into the box that it's inhabited all these years." Vondar said, taking over from his partner, "The problem was the power behind the spell. We had considered using the lost souls of the afterlife to power it, but the afterlife had been recently decimated another one of Omega's thuggish break ins as he searched for more power, and all the energy those lost souls possessed went into healing the realm. Adam and Eve refused to use their unique dominion over the dead to make them help us, so we were left with nothing."

"It was then, when despair ruled, that the remaining armies both good and evil united here and gave their life force to us." Insigil continued, looking around mournfully at all the trapped creatures. "We used what was left of our power to seal them within this realm as an inexhaustible source of magical energy. The power of a life is eternal, after all. It's only the body that gives out. All these beings contribute to the spell, forever singing, forever chanting the binding spell, making sure the Hollow is never unleashed again. They are the true power behind its incarceration"

"You're a telepath, not to mention you have the power of premonition." Vondar said, addressing Phoebe before nodding in the direction of the stone closest to the witch. "Touch the stone and see… and hear, for yourself."

Casting a wary glance at the nearest mound of stone and life next to her, Phoebe shakily raised her to hand to touch it. Thin tendrils of orange light poured from her forehead as she activated her telepathic powers, the strings of amber energy colliding with the rock before her hand did. The first thing that came into her head was singing. They were singing an ancient song in an indistinguishable language, and yet it was the most beautiful sound she had heard in her entire life. It was thrumming in her body, making it pulse from the sheer magnitude of all the voices in her head. Her hand, having stopped when her telepathic link was opened, finally made it to the stone, casting the witch's mind completely into the centre of the spell with a premonition.

Thousands upon thousands of spirits were around her. They possessed no physical form, just masses of green light that would expand and contract to the song that boomed all around her to the point where it would drive her insane if it wasn't so beautiful. She floated amongst all the souls, sweeping past them all as she seemed to be going somewhere else. The middle Charmed One could only presume she was seeing this through the eyes of an ancient descendant of the family, as the magical connection was the only reason as to why this was so vivid. They all continued to sing, casting the spell over and over again for thousands of years with their voices never tiring. Just always singing to the volume of thunder. It was magnificent.

Caught up in the strength and beauty of what she felt, Phoebe opened her mouth and began to sing along with the thousands of other souls. She was immediately ashamed at herself, when all that came out was a gargled wail, as if she was trying to sing underwater. The witch tried again, getting a stronger note, before it left her completely mute and everything around her vanished in a flash of white hot light.

"Phoebe!"

Next thing she knew she was staring upwards into the darkening sky, lying on the uneven ground with her sisters at both her sides, apparently recovering from a fall of some kind, "What happened?"

"You nearly got sucked in, that's what happened!" Piper spat, getting up to her feet and brushing the dirt off her clothes and hands. Hesitantly, she held out her hand to Phoebe, pulling her up just as Paige regained her full height.

"What?"

"The moment your hand touched the stone, a ton of orbs flew out and started to hover the way they did when Katrina had touched the stone." Paige began to explain, "But then they just completely surrounded you! You started to melt with the rock, so me and Piper pulled you out. You were singing as well."

"Sorry." Katrina offered, "I guess, as a higher being, I'm immune to their thrall. Although to be fair, you're the first person to ever do that so we didn't know there was any risk involved." She said, shooting a glare at Vondar who still stood with a stony glance on his face, as if he was also bound to the rock.

"The Angel's Melody…" Phoebe whispered, "It was the same song that you can hear in the Elemental Chamber. Are you telling me that the Angel's Melody is actually a banishment spell?"

"Yeah. After all, we were the ones who wrote it and who do technically come from the heavens. Hence the name!" Katrina said, grinning. It was clear she was trying to break the tension, but it just wasn't working. Not only were the Charmed Ones not in the mood for jokes, her colleagues weren't either.

"They're so tired…" Phoebe breathed sadly, "Their power and voices are inexhaustible, but still… all they want to do is rest. It's like they want to sleep, but they can't. I don't even think they're aware of how long this has been going on."

"Is this why you brought us here?" Paige spat, glaring at the three high beings, "So you could try and guilt us into fighting? Well, save it, because it's not going to work. If all these souls have been casting this spell for thousands of years, and they're not even tired, then they can go for a few thousand more. We've done our part. Diam and Tyola are history."

"We'll do it."

Paige spun around to face her eldest sister, a shocked look slapped on her face, "Piper?"

Piper shook her head at the futility of it all, "Paige, come on, we both know how this will go down. We'll say no, then we'll torture ourselves at the thought of all these trapped souls and end up changing our minds and fighting anyway. I'm just skipping over all that stuff so can get time we can't afford to waste. Besides, Phoebe's already made up her mind." She added, causing Phoebe to nod her head slowly.

"Alright… but if we die, you owe me."

Piper smirked in return, "Deal."

"You're very brave." Vondar said, the first hint of respect ever in his voice, "I was expecting we would have had to try and convince you some more, but your resolve is impressive. Now I see why you have been prophesized all these years." He took a deep breath, smiling a little as well, "It seems that your final battle will bring the end to more than just the Hollow. You'll end this song; you'll end all these souls' imprisonment, and so much more. Oh, _so_ much more."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Phoebe shot at him, her eyes narrowed into slits.

"If you'll win, you'll see eventually."

"That's enough, Vondar." Katrina said sharply, before turning back to the Charmed Ones, "You can just orb out of here now. Don't forget to pick up the Hollow on your way back. And one more thing…" She stopped, her eyes going down to the ground before she looked back up, a miserable smile on her face, "Just… cherish this night. And cherish each other." With those final words, the Charmed Ones vanished in a swirl of blue and white light, leaving the three higher beings in the gentle hum of all the energy around them.

"They have no idea what they're up against." Insigil said in a melancholy tone.

"Maybe that's for the best…." Katrina answered back, her tone equally in despair.

"The best for whom?"

"Everyone."

* * *

Piper carefully placed the box on the table, lowering it gently onto the surface before stepping back and staring at it with the rest of her family. The seven of them remained quiet, dumbstruck by what this meant. To some, it meant freedom, to others, it meant fear, and to others it just meant what would come tomorrow. Nonetheless, all these feelings would only mean something if they got the result they wanted when day broke. Without the various jewels, it looked so simple, so harmless. How could this measly black box be such a catalyst for all of their lives?

"So… it all ends tomorrow, no matter what the outcome." Pamela said solemnly, finally breaking the silence. She earned a slow nod from Piper at her statement, causing her to roll her eyes, "Figures it would clash with my time of the month." Six pairs of eyes were suddenly on her, all wide and incredulous, "Oh yeah, because _that's_ the most horrifying thing here!"

"We need to protect it." Leo said dutifully, drastically changing the subject and folding his arms, tucking his hands away as if he was afraid of his own actions.

"What are you talking about?" Aidan asked, frowning, "It can't get out."

"I don't mean it like that. Do you realize how coveted this box is? How powerful a tool it could be to anyone who tried to use it?" Leo asked, "It needs charms, hexes, incantations, enchantments… anything to make sure no one can touch it. The main reason the box can still be opened physically is because magic isn't allowed to tamper with free will. If the Source you vanquished years ago could open it, not to mention Diam and Tyola, then we have to protect it."

"Not to mention get some child proofing spell on it as well." Brennan added, "I know what I did when my mom would tell me something was very dangerous and that I was not to touch it." He said darkly, not even wanting to think of the various scenarios that could unfold if one of the kids opened the box.

"Exactly." Leo replied, solidifying Brennan's plan, "This is the whole reason boxes are such a magical tool. They tempt, they incite curiosity, whether it's just out of greed, ignorance, or innocence. They're one of the biggest holes in the free will argument."

"I know a blessing ritual that stops anyone sharing your blood from approaching the object you've blessed." Aidan said, "If all seven of us bless the box, that's sure to keep all the kids away."

"What about Lorna?" Pamela piped up, "She may be one of us, but not where her blood is concerned."

"Piper shares a link to Lorna through her elemental powers, which flow through both of their blood." Leo explained, glancing at his wife, "If Piper blesses it, then it'll become untouchable for Lorna as well." He jaw clenched nervously, seeing that the Charmed Ones were still looking deeply at the Hollow. They hadn't contributed at all to the conversation, "You guys should probably get started on all the protection spells… Just to be on the safe side."

"Nah," Piper replied casually, turning away from the Hollow and heading towards the attic door, "I should get started on dinner. We should all eat together tonight. I'll do a big chicken with all the trimmings… I should whip up a soufflé as well and I'm pretty sure we have enough vegetables for some kind of soup." She stopped in her tracks just before she reached the door, still in her dinner obsessed trance, "Or maybe not… I should go to the store."

"Piper, I think Chinese takeout would be a little more time effective, don't you?" Phoebe asked, casting a worried glance at her sister's back as she refused to turn around.

"No, it's fine." She said in eerily calm voice, "It'll all be done in a few hours."

Phoebe and Paige shared a look as their big sister floated off down the stairs. Heaving a sigh, they both went after her to try and get to the bottom of her sudden flash of desired normalcy.

"Um… I know this is kind of a weird thing to say, but…" Leo pursed his lips, slowly tapping his hands together, "Is there anything you guys want to do before this all kicks off? I mean, you all had lives before you became part of this family… or realized that you were part of this family." He added, smiling fondly in Pamela's direction. "It's just that I've got something I want to take care of and I was wondering if you guys needed to do something as well." He hesitated before speaking again, "After all, this might be our last chance."

* * *

"I could get into a lot of trouble for letting you do this, you know." Cole warned, pacing back and forth on one of the many platforms in the first stage of the afterlife. The lost souls, sensing his unrest, started to crowd around him in their orb form, the heartbeat getting faster making them excited. Eventually, he lost his temper slightly and batted them away, causing them to fly off like a cloud of disturbed insects. "I would have thought that this was the last place you'd come. Shouldn't you be spending time with your wife instead of hanging around here with me?"  
"Stop complaining." Leo retorted, shaking his head tiredly, "If it wasn't for me putting a good word in for you, you'd be nothing more than a lost soul that stays around this limbo. Some other being would have been swatting _you_ away a few seconds ago. Besides, I am spending time with my wife, just not the most recent one."

Cole arched his eyebrows in shock, "Well, Leo, I'm surprised. I never thought of you as one for bigamy. I never even thought of Piper being up for it."

"Shut up," The Elder replied like a child being teased, "And for the record, Piper does know about this. She also knows that this is important to me, so kindly keep your mouth shut when the soul gets here."

"Hey, you've saved me a journey. I hate walking uphill." Cole answered, smirking, "Just out of curiosity, how do you know that the soul's going to be here soon?"

"Just a feeling."

There was suddenly a cloud of glowing blue smoke next to them as the Angel of Death appeared with a frail old woman standing next to him, gripping Death's hand tightly purely out of fear, "What's he doing here? This isn't his job." Death spat at Cole, who held his hands up in surrender.

"He asked to do this. Who am I to ignore an Elder?" Cole replied with a triumphant smile on his face, sitting down and taking Leo's place as he stood up and walking towards the old woman.

"This… this can't be heaven." She said shakily, looking around her surroundings and immediately feeling a foreboding chill at all the faint wailing she could hear coming from the lights that flew around her, "But if it's not…" She cast her gaze onto Leo, a brave smile shimmering onto her face, "Then why are you here, Leo?"

"Its okay, Lillian." Leo said softly, holding out his hand and giving her a warm smile, "We've got a way to goes yet, but I'll get you there." He had watched over his first wife ever since he became a whitelighter, and it saddened him to see that she had succumbed to time, when he had remained immune. But the one thing that hadn't changed, ever since the day they had married, was the strength and light that always shone in her eyes. Even as a spirit, she possessed the same energy.

Slowly, Lillian raised her hand to his face, stroking his cheek delicately, "You look a little older than when I last saw you." She said, her wise eyes twinkling.

"You don't." He replied lovingly, wrapping his fingers round her hand as she slotted it into his.

"I always knew you were watching over me…" She said, before looking upwards to the light that seemed to be miles away, "So, we have to walk all the way up there, huh?" The Elder nodded in response, "Alright then, let's get started! The walk will do us good. We can even catch up along the way." She said cheerfully, beginning towards the narrow, sloping path that would lead them up into the light. After having watched her for so long and seeing how her life ended, Leo knew that she would easily accept her death. She had lived a full life, it was just a shame her body had given out before her spirit did, "So, tell me, what have you been up to as an angel?"

"Well… do you remember a girl called Piper Halliwell?"

* * *

It felt so empty now. Every step he took echoed throughout the entire cavern, accompanying the gentle humming of the giant computer systems that riddled the entire place. The lights felt dimmer, the space felt more plentiful. It was colder. This wasn't the Sanctuary he remembered. "You're just an old man in a cave these days, Adam." Brennan smirked at his former mentor, earning a glare of disapproval. Even Adam looked less happy here nowadays, but it could have just been the ravages of time. His hair was slightly whiter, more wrinkles were starting to appear on his face, and he looked paler, "Where's Mutant X Version… What one are we on now?"

"Hmm… I think if there was another Mutant X, we would be on the twelfth incarnation by now." Adam replied, a glimmer of sadness in his eyes as he spoke. With a sigh, he lowered himself down to sit on one of the steps that jutted out from the main body of Sanctuary, "There's not much point anymore I don't think. Cassie and Riley went and got lives for themselves, and Jesse and Lexa didn't think a dark cave was a good place for a baby, so I guess it ends here."

"Why?"

"Age." Adam replied simply, "Most mutants are your age now. They're not interested in flying off to try and stop corrupt governments or power mad scientists. They've all had families, settled down, and have started to live as long a life as their unstable genes will provide. So, until a new generation of mutant comes along, I don't think this place will be used for a while."

Brennan could tell that this depressed him severely, mainly because he knew Adam was feeling exactly what he felt, only much more stronger. Sanctuary symbolized everything he had worked for, everything he had accomplished, and now it just lay empty with the only company being the disconcerting silence. "I remember Shal falling down those stairs you're sitting on." He said, pointing past Adam and making him took to the top of the steps. "She had stolen Jesse's breakfast muffin and got a little carried away with her getaway back flips." The mutant then turned around and nodding at a large cluster of thick wires that all stemmed from the main computer, "Emma tripped and fell over there when she lost control of her roller skates. So many memories here… And now they're all going to gather dust…"

"What?"

"Uh… Nothing, it's fine."

Adam nodded slowly, deciding to pretend that he didn't hear what had been said, "So, what brings you here anyway?"

"Oh yeah," Brennan gasped, remembering his purpose for coming here, "Um… Something big is going down tomorrow. Something really big. It's something no one can avoid, and it's something that has to be taken head on… Anyway, I just thought I would come here and… Well, say thank you. Thank you for everything you've done for me. If it wasn't for you taking me in all those years ago, I don't want to think about where I'd be right now. I wouldn't have met my great friends, I wouldn't have met Phoebe, I never would have had my kids. You gave me a life; you've given everyone that's come in here a life." He laughed nervously when he stopped talking, before trailing off and mumbling something about "father" and "love".

"You're welcome." Adam replied simply. Despite his great intelligence, that was the only thing he could think of to sum up his feelings, "And you make it sound like sorting you guys out and getting you on the right path was a chore… Well, it was." He chuckled, causing Brennan laugh also, "But seeing all of you… live. Well, it's the best damn payout I could have asked for. You're all my proudest achievements. I didn't even need a genetics degree to do it."

The two of them shared a comfortable silence for a moment, before Brennan let out a groan and hit the wall next to him, "The thought of you being alone in here just… pisses me off. It's not right."

"Well, you never know what the future will bring." Adam replied brightly, "I've been thinking about maybe doing a few summer courses in the local college… That might even lead into a permanent teaching position. Although I won't say it wouldn't be a little boring to go from superpowered miracles of nature to football players and cheerleaders."

A spark seemed to ignite in Brennan's eyes as his mentor spoke. He spun around, facing Adam, "Hey, you know a lot about magic and witches' powers, don't you?"

"For a mortal, I guess."

"… And teaching has always been a passion of yours. I mean, how many lectures have you given at colleges? Not to mention to us when we were always falling off the rails."

"What's your point, Brennan?"

"Magic School." He answered, broad grin on his face, "This location is far away from civilization, you're the perfect headmaster, and I've seen this mountain from the outside. It's huge! With a little magical assistance, you could extend into the whole interior of the rock and make this place massive! Big enough to hold hundreds and maybe thousands of students! You could rebuild Magic School here; bring back all the former teachers… You'd be bringing back a pillar of the magical society. It would be incredible." The mutant spun around again, looking up at the blank rocky wall, "We could cast some two-way mirror spells on all these walls, so that on the outside, it looks like the normal cliff face, but on the inside, you get a ton of natural light and heat-"

"Are you serious?"

"_Yes!_" Brennan boomed back excitedly, grinning at Adam, "This can all happen. You just have to be willing. What do you say?"

"… I'll do it."

* * *

Aidan landed softly on the large plateau in the centre of the Elemental Chamber, the Angel's Melody pulsing off the walls. Now that he knew the true purpose behind the song, it made this place seem a lot less beautiful. For all he knew, this cave was actually part of the realm the higher beings had pulled Paige and the others into, and that his existence as an elemental actually contributed to the Hollow's banishment. Either way, he didn't want to be in here for a minute longer than he had to.

"I know you're in here." He called out, his voice echoing around the giant cavern as he glared into nothingness, "You're never anywhere else, so don't make me go through that sham ritual. I don't have the time."

"You certainly don't." A voice echoed around him. Like before, a large surge of light shot up from the dark water that surrounded him, momentarily dazzling the elemental before the two contrasting children that represented Satus, the spirit elemental, appeared floating before him. They descended onto the main platform, now standing before him with a stony gaze, the boy and girl having one eye encircled by a sun and moon respectively, "Given the severity of the situation about to befall this world, I would have thought you to be spending this precious time with loved ones, not skulking in caverns, enraging those of far greater power than you." Satus spat, talking through the boy and giving Aidan a threatening smile, along with a cold stare with his milky white eyes.

"What brings you here?" The girl asked, giving him a similar stare with her dark, empty eyes.

"Power." Aidan growled, "Two years ago, you offered me great power. I refused because there was no need for me to possess it, but now… Well, you know the situation with the Hollow."

"Know it?" The girl repeated, raising an eyebrow, "I'm part of the power that keeps that monster inside its cage. But then again, you already figured that out the moment your witch wife relayed information from the higher beings to you." She composed herself, standing up straight and clasping her hands, "Alas, you can't possess this power anymore. Back then, your status was at a balance between your magic and your blood. You've been the host to the god, Poseidon, since then, thus solidifying your link to your bloodline and not your magical one. This power is out of your reach-."

"I've denounced my crown." Aidan said abruptly, cutting Satus off, "I am no longer the king of Atlantis. If that doesn't prove that I've cut my bloodline, then I don't know what does. I'm nothing but an elemental now."

"Why?" The boy asked, genuinely curious, "What was stopping you from summoning Poseidon again? Last time it showed an extreme tendency for protecting those you love, I would have thought that was all you wanted. Why not let him take you over again?"

"Because I need control over the power, not the other way around." Aidan replied, frustrated, "I don't have time for games. If I don't get some kind of power boost, then we're finished. I die, my family dies, you die, everything and everyone _dies_. I know that the Hollow will unleash something on this world once the Charmed Ones enter its prison to defeat it, and I need the strength to destroy whatever comes out of that damn box. Now, are you going to give me the power, or not?"

"You dare to demand power from us, even though you don't even know what this power is?" Satus questioned him, again through the boy with a quizzical expression on his pale face.

"My family's in danger. You're damn right I dare."

"Very well." The children said in unison, before all Aidan saw was light.

* * *

She was absolutely sick of making this walk.

The world was possibly ending tomorrow, and all Pamela could think of doing was coming to this creepy, hollow apartment that represented everything that had gone wrong in her life. She hated the years of dirt that had destroyed the wooden floors, she hated the disgusting grime that stuck to the windows in layers, she hated how it always smelled of blood, and she hated how cold it was all the time, no matter what time of the year it was and no matter how long the sun had been shining in the windows. And yet, it was this place that she was drawn to when there was a possibility of her life ending. She needed closure.

With a sad sigh, the witch knelt down and picked up a piece of wood out of the piano wreckage. The thought of how it had been broken brought back fond memories, only for them to be snuffed out by the misery that was thick in the air here. Pamela dropped the piece of wood to the floor and glared angrily around the empty dining room. She wanted to destroy the darkness of this apartment, which no amount of sunlight would ever warm, and she knew exactly how to do it. "Let the object of objection become but a dream, as I cause the seen to become unseen…"

A burst of refreshing, frosty air flew from Pamela's spot in the room, the spell presumably taking the physical appearance of one of her powers as all the dirt vanished from the room, leaving shiny, varnished floorboards, spotless glass in the window panes, and new glass in the panes that had none. The wave of ice spread out of the room and to the entire apartment. Pamela watched as the ice swept passed the door to her left, instantly rejuvenating the hallway and going out into the foyer, where the main table was also restored, along with the vase of flowers that stood on it. The pieces of the vase flew up and came together, completely clean, while a bouquet of flowers exploded out the top of them. A new source of light caught her attention above her, and she looked up to find the giant chandelier on the ceiling back to how it used to be. And finally, with euphoric glee, she watched as the piano came back to life before her eyes, its perfect black finish shining elegantly in all the light that now made the room positively glow.

Her fingers dancing along the pearly white keys as she walked to the door with a smile on her face, Pamela reached into her pocket and pulled out her cellphone, immediately beginning to dial before raising it to her ear. There was one last thing she needed to do.

"Hey, Grandma… Yeah, it's me. I was wondering if that offer you made about today still stands."

* * *

Pamela froze just before her finger hit the doorbell. She really wasn't sure if she was ready for this. Reviving the Walker apartment had left her with a momentary high, along with a burst of short lived confidence that had dissipated the moment she hung up on her grandmother. The witch bit her lip before heaving a large sigh, "Today is a day to be a coward…" She turned around and walked back down the path, putting her sunglasses on to shield her eyes from the evening sun.

"…get it out of the trunk…" Pamela swiveled round and panicked when she saw a woman coming out of the front door, her back turned as she continued a conversation with someone inside the house. She had dark brown hair, and when she turned around, she revealed a pair of cerulean coloured eyes. A smile was gradually fading from her face as she moved away from the conversation in the house, presumably heading for her car. It vanished completely when she saw the petrified girl standing in her way, "Uh… Can I help you?" She asked, speaking very articulately.

"Um, no. It's okay." Pamela stammered, smiling, "I just had the wrong house, I'm sorry."

"You know, it's rude to speak to someone without giving them proper eye contact." She said sharply, pointing to her own eyes and then pointing to Pamela's.

"Oh! Sorry, sorry…" The witch said hurriedly, taking off her sunglasses with haste. Pamela guessed that this woman was one of her aunts. She was clearly the aunt that made sure you washed your hands before each meal she was present for as a child. But something in her eyes also made her seem very approachable and down to earth. It was the same quality she had seen in her father so many times. The woman's mouth fell open a little when Pamela removed her shades, revealing her eyes and the severity of the scar that ran down her face, "Yeah, it's alright. I get that reaction a lot when people see it for the first time."

The older woman frowned, not understanding what she meant before a moment before her eyes nearly popped out of her, "Oh, no! I'm so sorry; it wasn't the scar I was looking at… Well, it was, partially, but not for the reason you think. You… You're Pamela, aren't you?"

Her heart stopped beating for just a minute. She suddenly felt the need to hide behind her sunglasses once again, but resisted it in favour of making an extremely nervous smile, "What gave me away?"

"The eyes." She responded simply, "They're exactly like my brother's. My other brother was always jealous of him for them, because he thought that they got Andy all the girls, but Duncan was perv. That's why girls didn't go for him. And…" She traced the line of Pamela's scar down her own face, "My parents told us about you around a year ago and have been keeping us up with your life ever since. They thought it would be better that way rather than you showing up all of a sudden and everyone reacting on their first instinct, which may have ended up bad for all of us. Anyway, they told us you were mugged and how you got the scar, so that's why I was staring at it."

Pamela pursed her lips bashfully, sighing once again, "Look, if you want to just pretend you never saw me, I'll completely understand. I wasn't even going to come to this family barbeque thing today, but Grandma invited me and really wanted me to come… But, I think you're in a better position to judge on whether or not I'm welcome." The stood in silence for a moment, before Pamela spoke again, "Actually, you know, I should just go. I'm sorry if I've tarnished your evening."

"Yeah, you should go." She agreed, before the smallest of smiles appeared on her lips, "I mean, you're not going to be able to help me carry Justin's bike from the trunk if you're just standing there."

"Justin?"

"Your cousin, my son. I'm Sally by the way." She said, walking past Pamela and out to the sidewalk where her car was parked outside the house. "Yeah, between me, Duncan, and my other sister, Katherine, you have seven cousins." Sally explained, pulling the trunk open and taking one end of the bike as Pamela took another, "So, let's see, we have your grandparents, which you've already met. Katherine, who spoils her three kids rotten and who has a husband who makes jokes at the most inappropriate times-,"

"Something tells me I'll be hearing a lot of his material then." Pamela smirked, before panicking again. Had she crossed a boundary she didn't have the right to cross yet?

Sally just grinned wryly, "You catch on quick. Then there's Duncan, who will be treating you like family instantly. That's just the way he is. He's divorced, but his kids are here today. They're pretty quiet, but are nice if you just sit down and talk to them." They were now walking up the front path, "My husband, Dan, had a construction job so he couldn't be here today, which is why I got stuck lugging this thing out back for Justin. He's the eldest of my two. Oh, and one last thing. Your great grandmother, Silvia. When she falls asleep, which happens often, her teeth have a tendency to just fall out her mouth. Just so you don't get shocked when it happens."

"Wow, so much I have to learn." Pamela breathed, opening the front door and walking in backwards as she held the surprisingly heavy bike.

"I think that's true for all us today."

* * *

As she entered through the Manor doors, Pamela's smile slid right off her face at what she saw. The dining table was more made up than it was at all the holidays combined. Shiny silver serving trays were lined up along the middle of the table, running all the way down to the place that was set at the head. Past that, a chocolate fountain, which Piper had only used once before, stood obnoxiously on the dresser that was at the end of the room, sprouting liquid chocolate onto the twins' hands, who seemed to be extremely taken with the idea of moving chocolate. Pamela could already see it being toppled over sometime tonight. There was a reasons, after all, why Piper had only used it once.

Her family sat like prisoners in their places, giving each other awkward glances from their seats and fidgeting with the napkins in their laps. Leo sat at one of the spots next to the top of the table, looking thoroughly lost, and embarrassed over his wife's obsessive and inconvenient behaviour. "I thought you guys were going to talk her out of it!" Pamela hissed, knowing that Piper was in the kitchen, probably preparing another dish.

"We tried. But she's flipped." Phoebe responded meekly, her place mirroring Leo's on the other side of the table. "Do _you_ want to argue with a psychotic Piper while she's holding a pot of boiling water?"

"Look, Pam, just sit down." Leo pleaded, gesturing to the spot next to Brennan, as it was the only free spot left at the table. She looked into the conservatory to see that the children's table had been set up also with Wyatt sitting at the top of it, looking slightly annoyed that he wasn't allowed to sit with grown ups. Pamela would have traded her spot with him in a second, as she knew this was probably going to be the most tense dining experience of her life. "If we can get through this quickly, we can get back to the Hollow."

"How far did you guys get with the spells?" She asked, reluctantly lowering herself into her seat.

"Um… We got the essentials cast, then a few extras…" Brennan relayed, trying to remember all the spells they had used, "We did the ritual Aidan had suggested as well," He added, gesturing to the elemental on the other side of the table, who looked positively pale and catatonic, "But we haven't done any of the ones that require the Power of Three, mainly because we couldn't make Piper stop honing her culinary craft instead of her Wiccan one."

"That's ridiculous…" Pamela muttered tiredly, biting her lip, "Did no one think of just… shaking her? Violently?"

"Soup!"

They all jumped in surprise as Piper burst through the kitchen door, carrying a large tray holding seven bowls of soup. Her smile was unsettling, and gave the witch a manic quality as she passed the bowls around, before sitting down herself. She briefly glanced over to the children to make sure they were enjoying the dinner she had given them earlier, before turning to the rest of them and grinning, "Alright, dig in! There're six more courses after this!"

"You prepared _seven_ courses?" Pamela exclaimed, her mouth agape, "What, are you planning on cooking the giant pink elephant in the room as well? Ow!" She suddenly snapped around to Paige when she felt a heel dig into her shin, receiving a small shake of the head from the witchlighter, along with a dark frown, warding her off from going further.

"It smells great, Piper." Paige said through bared teeth, giving her big sister a similar smile before nearly going face down into her soup bowl from cowering away from the conversation. She could have slurped the soup up without a spoon at the proximity she was at. It was lucky for her that her hair was in a ponytail and therefore out of the soup.

Deciding to finally bite her tongue, Pamela looked down to the soup in front of her and took a spoonful. She couldn't even taste it. A meal like this was completely wasted on people this tense and terrified. Her eyes went crossed eyed as she looked down at the spoon in her mouth, pulling it out and inspecting it before looking down at the bowl below her, "You're using the good china…"

"Uh huh." Piper responded brightly.

"You never use the good china…"

"…And now I am!"

"So you really _do_ think we're going to die."

"Pam, please, just drop it…" Phoebe begged, looking down her side of the table with a look of desperation on her face.

"No!" She shouted back, staring straight at Piper, who was clearly trying to ignore the emotional implosion going on in front of her and continuing to eat her soup, her eyes down into the bowl, "This is disgusting." She spat, looking around everything on the table with disdain.

"Really? I thought you liked my soup."

"I'm not talking about the soup!" Pamela snapped, her eyes blazing, "I'm talking about you sitting us down for this… _twisted_ Last Supper-esque meal. It's like you've given up before you've even slung a punch. What is the matter with you? The fate of the world is in your hands tomorrow, and instead of preparing those hands for that burden, they spent the entire afternoon up a chicken's ass!"

"Pam, the children." Leo said through tight lips, noticing that the kids had all turned to the main table, in fear of the full scale meltdown that was happening before them.

"This is a farce…" She growled; standing up from the table and throwing her napkin into the soup, sending it splattering all cover the pristine cleanliness of the table cloth and marring the whole meal. "You can sit here and humour her neurosis while she signs our death warrants with each one of those seven courses, but I'm going upstairs to at least try and make sure we're not all just a big pile of _ash_ this time tomorrow!"

"Pam…" Piper began in a low voice, calmly putting down her spoon and looking up at her niece, who was nearly completely out of the room, "Sit. _Down_."

"Make me…" Pamela snarled over her shoulder, shaking her head and heading towards the stairs.

With that final dare, Piper flew up from her seated position, her chair falling backwards and slamming into the dresser as it did. The force of the collision sent the chocolate fountain toppling, brown liquid spurting everywhere and spreading all over the wooden floor, soaking the edge of the rug. "_Sit down!_"

Just before Pamela could make it to the stairs, the vase that stood on the foyer table suddenly exploded in a shower of glass, water, and flowers. A small shard flew off and sliced into the young witch's cheek, blood now running down her face from a small cut just below her left eye. She pressed her hand to her fresh wound, slowly turning around to face Piper, terror and tears mixing in her eyes.

A deathly silence fell upon the room as all eyes fell upon the leader of the entire family who stood at the top of her table, her outfit covered in liquid chocolate, her face red with misery and anger. They had never seen the eldest Charmed One act this way. A part of all them even feared that she was going to raise her hands and finish the job. Thankfully, their fears didn't come to pass. A heart wrenching sob broke through the quiet as Piper nearly fell to her knees, holding onto the table for support as tears flooded her face before she bolted from the room and retreated to the kitchen. Pamela followed suit and suppressing her own angry sobs, bared her teeth and ran up the stairs, her hand still pressed against her wound.

Preserving their mute state, Phoebe and Paige rose from their seats and went after their big sister, going into the kitchen with Leo close behind. With a long, sad sigh, Brennan calmly took his napkin off his lap and placed it on the table, heading towards the stairs after doing so, "Aren't you coming?" He asked Aidan, who was still sitting at the table. It looked like he hadn't even picked up his spoon.

The elemental blinked a few times, "…What?"

"What's wrong with you? You've been acting like a zombie since you came back from… wherever the hell you went this afternoon."

"Nothing…" Aidan murmured to himself, before shaking his head vigorously, "Nothing. Come on, let's go."

* * *

"What the hell, Piper?" Phoebe raged as she stomped into the kitchen to find Piper facing the sink, staring out of the window, "If that piece of glass had been a few inches higher, she would have one eye right now! You could have killed her!" She fumed, still getting no reaction from her elder sibling.

"What's the difference?" Piper replied darkly, "It would have been only a day earlier anyway?"

"Where is coming from?" Paige asked, exasperated, "You were the one who had the final sign off on this fight. In fact, you were the one who convinced _me_ into doing it!" She shook her head, at a loss at her sister's behaviour, "The last thing we need is for you to completely lose your marbles before a big fight. It's not helping anyone, especially the… _madness_ that just happened in there."

"She said to cherish this night! Katrina said to cherish this night and each other." Piper shouted back, turning around to face her sisters, "If a superpowered woman who's been alive for over three thousand years tells you to cherish something, then you better hold on to it tight! All I wanted was for all us to sit down, have a meal, and love each other one last-,"

"One last time?" Phoebe finished for her, "Piper, Pam's right, you're giving up before the fight's even begun, and this dinner was just a shockwave of your completely debilitating fear taking over you!"

"You can't think that you're going to lose," Leo added, "What makes this different from facing the Source? Or Gideon? Or Zankou? Or Satanos? Or any evil that's ever had the stupidity to come through those doors and get sent straight back to Hell? You are so much stronger than anything in this world, Piper. This entire family takes its strength from you. And when you fall apart… Well, we get situations like what happened back there."

"Do you remember what Mom said on your wedding day?" Phoebe asked quietly, as if she was silently pleading with her big sister to be strong once again, "That you were the heart of this family. It wasn't just because you were the middle sister and in the centre of us, that hasn't been true for a long time. It was because you're the mightiest, most courageous person in this entire family." Her jaw clenched, and she looked upon Piper with frustration, "Do _not_ crumble now. We need you now, more than ever."

"If only to clean up the mess in the dining room." Paige added jokingly, making the four of them smile slightly.

Leo moved past his sisters in law and enveloped his wife in a tight hug, regardless of all the chocolate that covered her clothes, "You can do this, honey. We all believe in you." He murmured in her ear, pulling away to see her finally regain some clarity after a day of insanity. With a look of determination set on her face, she turned to her sisters and narrowed her eyes.

"Let's get to work!"

* * *

**Next time – SERIES FINALE!**


	40. Set Us Free, Part I

_So here's the thing. I originally planned for the finale to be one chapter. But it just kept going on and on and on… I finished it, and it was 75 PAGES. Go figure. So know, I'm gonna be splitting it into three chapters. Each chapter is a part of "Set Us Free", and each chapter will have a sub-title. So yeah, three parts. They're all completed, and I'll probably update every three days. TCTB will have 42 chapters now. Enjoy! And now onto this…_

_Well, everyone, we're finally here. The series finale. To be honest, I really didn't expect this fic to take off. I had lurked around the site for a while, and knew from experience that crossovers fics hardly ever took off regardless of how talented the writer is. But I like to think that I made this fic approachable for all Charmed fans, and while my popularity seems to have waned from its peak in "United As Three", every single review has meant so much to me, even if it was to deliver criticism. So yes, thanks to all of you for keeping me going these past two and half years. This trilogy is just as much yours as it is mine. Although I still have copyright on certain things. Lol._

_This three parter is dedicated to __**CAL**__. May you remain eternally magnificent. And to all you readers, especially if you've been around since "A Power Divided" was known as "The Lone Charmed One". Thanks for sticking with me to the end._

**Set Us Free, Part I (Every End Must Begin)**

It was mass of darkness with thousands of lights springing forth from its depth, like the starry sky that lay above it.

That, Katrina had decided, was what San Francisco looked like from her vantage point atop the Golden Gate Bridge. The headlights from the cars that rolled underneath her lit her up in a dramatic way as her somber face stared towards the city blanketed by night. Hundreds of thousands of people lived there, yet only seven knew what was at stake tomorrow. They were bearing the weight of that knowledge for the entire world so they could stay oblivious and carefree. That took strength and courage which Katrina wasn't sure even she possessed.

"You're standing a little close to the edge."

The higher being turned around to find one of her colleagues leaning on the beam behind her, surveying the sight before him with a cold glare, "C'mon, Vondar. You and I both know I could fall from here a hundred times over and it would never kill me." She spun back to her original position, silence passing between the two for a moment before she spoke again, "Do… ever think about it?" Katrina kept her gaze out towards the city and the dark ocean that lay all around them. "Death, I mean."

"All the time." Vondar replied gravely, letting his head lie against the crimson metal with a blissful smile on his face, "I imagine it to be peaceful once your body is destroyed, as its just your soul left after that, completely free of all the shackles you've had chained to you in life. After you've lived as long as we have, your breath becomes stagnant; the life in your eyes dulls… Is that what it means to be higher being?"

"Must we really call ourselves that anymore?" Katrina groaned, her face falling from fatigue that one could only get from living for so long, "I've heard of timeless jokes, but that one as to be the longest running in history. Especially recently…"

"Indeed." He answered lowly, "Out of all the years we've been in this world, the last three hundred or so have been the longest."

His partner nodded slowly, "Magic grows and adjusts over time though. If we had given monumental power to one being all at once, they would have been consumed and destroyed, taking the power with them. We planted the seed of the power in Melinda Warren all those years ago, letting it grow over time and generations… And now, we finally have a force strong enough to defeat the Hollow. We couldn't have just _made_ the power that the Charmed Ones possess. I will admit though, I thought we were going to have to start all over again when Prue died. We knew that Paige would step in, of course, but I always had reservations about her being half-whitelighter."

"Do you plain on telling them that we are the ones responsible for the mantel of power they now possess?"

"No. What would that solve? There's no need for them to know, it wouldn't change anything… Just like us in a way, if you think about it." She finally made eye contact with him, smiling wryly, "The world no longer needs grand powers rising into the heavens and breathing down its neck. It's time we finally get swept up in the winds of change and let go." Looking over her shoulder, Katrina gave one last mournful look to the city before continuing the conversation.

"It's like you said. We get to be completely free now."

* * *

As he woke up, it took Brennan a few seconds to realize that there was a Phoebe-shaped gap in the bed. Frowning, he sat up properly and looked around the dark room, no sign of his wife anywhere. The covers on her side of the bed had folded over and looked like how they should if she had gotten up of her own free will, which calmed the mutant down slightly. But the question still remained: where was she?

Light poured from the kitchen into the living room as Brennan walked down the stairs, squinting his eyes against the harsh glow as he reached the bottom step. He stood at the kitchen doorway, his eyesight taking a while to adjust to sudden harsh light before he could finally see Phoebe sitting at the table, scribbling furiously on a notepad which seemed to have been cannibalized slightly, if the dozens of sheets of paper around her were anything to go by, "Um… Phoebe, what are you doing?"

"Just writing some spells." She replied casually, not even looking up, "I may even I'll put some of these in the book later."

Brennan's shoulder drooped tiredly. He had been hoping that she would be the only Halliwell that didn't act out some bizarre stress coping mechanism. But writing spells feverishly at four in the morning, with there being evidence of this happening even earlier in the night, was not a good sign. He slowly sat down next to her, noticing the unusually messy handwriting on the spells that his wife had discarded all over the table, "Do you really think it's necessary to be doing this at this hour? I mean, I'm sure…" Brennan picked up one of the spells and gave it a funny stare, "… the spell to render someone mute could have waited until morning."

"I've gotta put my energy into something." She answered quietly in a manic tone.

"What energy?" He asked, shocked, "You didn't sleep all last night because you were busy chasing Diam and Tyola, and you didn't even get a power nap or something during the day because we were too busy. We were all up until midnight doing research and formulating plans… You've had around three hours sleep to last you two days. You must be exhausted."

"Oh, totally, I'm almost ready to faint. I can't really even see what I'm writing anymore." Phoebe replied casually, continuing to write with her hand shaking even more, "But, you see, my job as the middle sister is to stay grounded and let everything wash over me, like a rock in the middle of the ocean… Oh, that's a good simile. I should work it into my next spell." She suddenly ripped the sheet of paper from the notepad violently and let it fall to the floor, "Piper has a massive, public freak out, Paige silently panics before turning that panic into power, and me? I don't let anything affect me. But this time, I know that if I let myself stop for just one second, I'll think, and thinking is something that I really want to avoid because if I think then I'll over think and then I'll crumble into this tragic mass of hysteria and just be a general train wreck and then be good for absolutely nothing!" Phoebe finally breathed, not even realizing that her writing had descended into a mass of squiggly lines, "So, you see, I need to keep going until this is over, because if I don't, I won't be able to start up again, like an old car, or one of those-,"

"Okay, that's enough similes." Brennan coolly, cutting her off. He then reached forward and gently pulled the pen from her grasp and placed it on the table, "And that's enough spells…" He pulled his chair closer to her, "Just don't think about it." He murmured, holding her head with both hands and forcing her to make eye contact, "Think about all the letters you haven't answered in your column and come with advice for them. Count sheep; try to remember all the stuff we have in the fridge. Anything that takes your mind off it."  
"I've tried!" She wailed tiredly, "I've tried all those sleep techniques were you _bore_ yourself into unconsciousness, but it doesn't work because I always wind back up to what comes next!"

"Then think about what comes next!"

"Do you realize how _massively_ contradictory you're being right now?"

"You don't get it. Think about the after." He said simply, "After you beat the Hollow, what comes next? Us! You, me, the kids. Everyone you love being peaceful and happy all because of your actions. Not only will that spur you to fight, but it'll let you go to sleep with a smile on your face. Now, _please_, come back to bed."

"…But what if I can't do that?" She whispered, her weary, bloodshot eyes threatening to unleash a flood of tears.

"You will." Brennan said softly, drawing his thumbs over her cheeks and wiping away the falling tears, "I mean, come on, do you really want to spend most of your final battle barely conscious?" She let out a meek laugh at this, one of husband's hands falling from her face and taking her hand, "C'mon, you need to get some sleep…"

* * *

"I can't believe you actually suggested this."

"Hey, we're in the height of summer, which means the water's warm no matter what the time of day is. It isn't freezing like the last time."

Every article of clothing Paige and Aidan had been wearing lay on top of two large towels that sat on the sandy bank of Lake Skylark. The entire area was in silence, only the sound of the water lapping against the boat at the dock marring this quiet. The slowly growing light in the sky made the water sparkle around the couple who were entwined at the centre of the lake, arms around each other and their foreheads together.

"This is the most relaxed I've felt in a long time…" Paige whispered, sniggering a little, "Who knew skinny dipping was so calming?" She let her head fall back, looking up to the fading stars in the sky that were being enveloped by the growing sunlight. Her husband continued to keep a loose hold on her as she bent back completely, her ears immersed in the water and exchanging the quiet sound of crickets to the soothing din of water. "You know…" She began to speak, her voice muffled to her hearing as her head was still partially underwater, "I think I finally get why you love the water so much. It always around you, but it gives you complete freedom. It comforts you, but allows you to take care of yourself. It's amazing…" The witchlighter had lifted her head back up, allowing the water to fall from her ears and listen to his answer.

"Wow, and it only took you nearly seven years do figure it out." He said with a grin, before his expression turned wistful and he too looked up at the stars, "God… Seven years. Has it really been that long since I saved you from that burning building?"

Paige let out an embarrassed laugh and rolled her eyes at his wording, "You make it sound like I was completely smitten by the fact that me, nothing but a delicate lady, was saved by the big fireman. Let's not forget, _you_ were the one who asked _me_ out first. _And_ you were the first one to admit love in our relationship." She smirked, victorious. "Sounds I was the one who saved you."

Aidan shrugged his shoulders, unfazed, "Oh please, don't pretend that you wanted to do all those things as well. I just thought it would be easier to skip over the flirtatious banter and what I would come to know as 'Halliwell neurosis', and tell you how I felt." He cocked his head, a thin smile on his lips, "I mean, sure, I could have done without stuff like astral projections not being able to get back into bodies, alcohol relapses, and that darklighter Hades, but…"

"And _I_ could have done without secret after secret blowing up in my face, getting left pregnant; and godly body snatchers who nearly kill my niece, but…"

"It all worked out in the end." Aidan finished for both of them, grinning and kissing her softly, relishing her touch as her fingers played with the wet hair on the back of his head. They pulled apart, sunlight finally coming over the hill on the horizon and illuminating the Skylark bank in morning light. "I think we should head back now. The moment the kids realize crystals are their only chaperone, they'll tear the house apart for fun."

"Okay…" Paige murmured back, grabbing his hand before he began to swim away, "Don't you dare leave me today." She growled, her voice determined and panicked at the same time, "I mean it. We've lost each other too many times to do it again. This is us for life. So just… don't leave."

"…I promise."

* * *

Piper knew that she was being irrational, but she wouldn't be able to sleep until she had at least tried, so she took comfort in the fact that this current bout of irrational behaviour was the size of an ant compared to her actions earlier that night. The witch wrapped her nightgown around herself as she began to climb the attic stairs, briefly looking out of the hallway window to see that light was already gathering on the horizon, casting a beautiful array of soft, pastel colours on the sky. She was fighting to preserve this. To keep the sunrise.

Reaching the top of the stairs, she jumped with fright when she saw someone at the centre table. Her heartbeat relaxed when she recognized it as Pamela, who was sleeping soundly on top of the Book of Shadows. Piper could only smile at this picture. She knew from experience that the many pages of the family's tome were a great pillow when you were sleep deprived. Her smile faded though when she was reminded of the night's events. She kept seeing the look of utter betrayal in her niece's eyes from when she had hurt her. It was probably an image that would stay with Piper for the rest of her life, and while she wanted to always learn from it, she didn't want it to be the only thing she thought of when she thought of Pamela.

Sitting down in one of the free chairs at the table, Piper gently shook her niece's arm, "Pam, wake up…" She urged softly, smirking when she heard a pained groan from underneath the mask of hair, "Yeah, your neck is probably killing right now. Why didn't you go home last night?"

Pamela slowly lifted her head off the Book of Shadows, revealing a large imprint of a triquetra on her cheek from resting on the front cover for so long, "I thought it would be better if I stayed on West Coast time. There's nothing worse than being jet lagged for an Apocalypse." She replied, looking through bleary eyes out the window and yawning. "What time is it?"

"The sun's rising, so I'm guessing around five." Piper answered, "Can we talk about what happened at dinner?"

"No." Pamela responded flatly and petulantly, clearly still tired, "You apologized, I accepted, Leo healed my cut. It's over."

"But I nearly killed you."

"So?" The younger witch questioned with a raised eyebrow, "I nearly killed all of you when I turned into a werewolf, and from what I hear, you could have killed everyone when you got infected by that arachnid mutant. This family's always nearly killing each other. And sometimes, we even succeed. It's our way to saying 'I love you'. Just think of it as a delightful quirk. Like a lisp; or two different coloured eyes."

"…Are you sure?" Piper frowned deeply, putting her hand on her niece's, "Because there's a chance I may not be here to clear the air properly if you're not okay with it now, so it's better to just tell me."

Pamela responded by outing her free hand on top of the two already joined, "I assure you, I'm fine." She said, a small smile on her face, "I think we must let our emotions get the better of us. You were petrified at the thought of what might happen to all us in this battle, and I…. well, I did some stuff yesterday that made me realize I want more time. There's still so much I have to learn, to see, to do… And I just got pissed at the fact that it seemed to you had given up. But that's changed now, right?"

"Absolutely." Piper replied strongly, getting up from her chair walking into the dark depths of the room, "That's actually the reason I'm up here." She added, opening a large chest that was up against the back wall. "Ugh, I forgot how heavy this was…" The witch groaned, reaching in with both hands and finally pulling out the large oak surface that was the family's spirit board. She lay out down on the floor, before rummaging for the pointer and carrying both over to the main table, where Pamela stared at the instrument in confusion.

"The spirit board?" She questioned cynically, running her hands over the shiny finish, briefly tracing the outline of the triquetra in the centre with her finger, "Are you going to ask it if we're going to win today?"

"Ha!" Piper smiled ruefully, "I don't think so. After fourteen years, I've learned that the universe doesn't like to away the punch lines to its big jokes." She explained sourly, before placing the pointer in the centre, "I'm gonna ask it if there's a way to defeat the Hollow."

"I thought you guys decided you would know what to do when the time came."

"Yeah, but even thought we're the queens of improvisation, I think we should have some kind of plan if we're going against the most powerful being in the universe." The eldest Charmed One replied, placing two of her fingers on one side of the pointer and inviting Pamela to do the same on the other side, "C'mon, it'll work better with two of us." Once her niece had complied, she took a deep breath and closed her eyes. "Is there a way to beat the Hollow?"

She kept her eyes closed, thinking that if she stayed calm the spirit board would have a better chance at working. Piper stayed like this for a handful of seconds, before opening one eye to find that the pointer was still square on top of the triquetra. Her shoulders drooped and she sighed in disappointment, before she suddenly felt the pointer move beneath her fingertips, the sound of wood scraping against wood catching her hearing… before it stopped again. It hadn't even gone to any letter or number.

At this moment, she narrowed her eyes and turned to her niece, who was currently biting her lip and clearly repressing a snigger, "… Did you move the pointer with your powers?"

"…No."

"You _always_ move the pointer."

At this, she could only smile, "It was just one more time for sentimental value. Sorry."

* * *

"You are all doing to die."

Piper was the first to explode at this threatening statement, "Excuse me?"

"I figured it was a good way to get all of your attention." Katrina explained, looking out to the seven shocked faces that were staring back at her, just beginning to get over what the Higher Being had said. "I'm here to give you some last minute advice before the fight." She said. "Now, it's pretty obvious that you three…" She gestured in the general direction of the Charmed Ones, "Are going to be the ones doing the bulk of the fighting, but that doesn't mean that you guys aren't going to have something to do as well."

"What do you mean?" Leo asked wearily. Having just dropped off his children at their grandfather's with the thought that he may never see them again; he wasn't in the mood for having to interpret cryptic messages.

"The elementals." Katrina stated, "The four ancient elementals that sealed Diam and Tyola away around five hundred years ago. You're familiar with that, obviously, as it's one of the main reasons as to why those two started to come after you in the first place. To get you." She pointed towards Aidan, who shifted uncomfortably under her scrutiny, "Don't worry, handsome. Out of all the things I've been to all of you, potential love interest isn't one of them, despite how I landed in your lives. Anyway, there was a price for using so much energy to seal away such powerful beings, and that price was to be sealed themselves. Now, the Hollow's had five hundred years to corrupt them into serving it, and whenever it's threatened, it sends out these four warriors to attack. But since the Charmed Ones will be within it, they'll go after their nearest and dearest, meaning you four."

"What about the kids?" Brennan asked.

"They're protected." She replied simply, her face passive for a moment, "Magic concerning the safety of children is deep and complicated, and after all these years, I'm not even sure I understand it myself, but trust me, they'll be fine. It's yourself you should be worrying about. These elementals haven't just been corrupted, they've been infected. They're part of the Hollow, and because of it, they're a lot stronger than normal elementals. Hell, the water elemental was a little girl before she was turned!"

"So, what does this mean?" Pamela inquired, keeping a hand over her jacket pocket protectively.

"It means your best chances are to split up before they come after you. Separated, these guys are unbelievably powerful, but united… they're invincible. Their combined power would kill all of you in seconds."

"Oh, that's comforting…"

"But you can beat them; you just have fight harder than you ever have before." Katrina said hopefully, stepping forward, "And now, for our main cast members." She said with a rueful smirk, glancing at the three witches that stood quietly at the edge of the large sofa, "You're going to see things in the Hollow that make absolutely no sense. Things that you know don't exist will, and overall, you'll be tested. Remember, the Hollow has swallowed entire species and civilizations. That all has to go somewhere."

"What is that supposed to mean?" Phoebe asked sharply, frowning and standing to her full height.

"You'll see soon enough." She said calmly, "Just remember your bond as sisters. And believe or not… you'll have allies within the Hollow, but only if you get deep enough. Don't forget the love you have for each other, and most of all, stick together." Katrina took a deep breath and sighed, blowing out her cheeks and swinging her arms. "I guess that's it… Good luck." With that, she vanished in flash of blue light and left the family reeling from all the information she had just given them.

After a while, the seven of them began to disperse and leave the attic, "Hey." Brennan turned around to see Pamela hailing him, holding a light purple potion in her hands. "I need to talk to you about something."

"Okay… What is it?"

"I want you to take this." She held the potion outwards.

Brennan frowned, "What's in it?"

"It's a witch's kamikaze. I found it in the Book of Shadows. If you take it, all the magic in your body will be violently released when you're on the brink of death, killing everyone around you. It's so that if we get taken down, we don't go down alone." She said gravely, putting the potion in his hand and waiting for a response, "Look, I don't like it either, but it's the only way to ensure we win no matter what."

"Even if we die? Pam, that's not winning. At best, that's a tie." He held on to the potion, looking down on his niece. "You need to have a little bit of faith. We'll all get through this. Hell, you're one of the best fighters I have ever known. If anyone is going to survive this, it's you. Please tell me you haven't already taken this."

"No… I was thinking we could do it at the same time, kinda like a shot of vodka before going into a fight."

"Well, I'm not. We are going to survive, and I even if I do get to brink of death, what's to say that I wouldn't have already taken down the elemental and I just can't get anyone to come and heal me? Then I will have just blown up for nothing. It's too risky." He held out his hands, "Now, give me the other vial." She did so. "And the other one…" She pulled another one from jean pocket, "And the other one…" Frowning darkly, she did so, handing over the final potion from her back pocket. "You don't need this stuff."

Pamela watched him walk off and vanish down the attic stairs, looking after him and making sure he didn't come back up, before reaching down and pulling up her jean leg, revealing a potion holster of sorts attached to her ankle, and another bright purple vial within it, "You always ask three times, newbie…" She murmured, before downing the potion in one gulp.

* * *

"This is ridiculous…"

"Oh, come on, Piper. Just embrace it!"

"I'm kinda siding with Piper here, Pheebs. If we die, I don't want to be found wearing this."

Phoebe sighed and gave her best pleading eyes to both her sisters, who were glaring at her from different points around the giant cauldron that they had set up atop the Golden Gate Bridge. It was made from a charmed pewter rock, and was currently bubbling over with massive, consuming plumes of smoke that ran off the side of the red metal beam. A particularly forceful gust of wind picked up, making all three witches raise a hand to the conical hats on their heads to make sure they didn't go flying off into the air and make their location even more obvious. "Look, whether we like it or not, all the stuff about pointed hats and cauldrons makes us stronger. And since we're about to break in to a prison that's held its prisoner for nearly four thousand years, I think the extra power boost is needed. Just think…" She pressed her hands against the edge of the pewter cauldron that was in the centre of them, giving them a bittersweet smile. "This may be the last ever time we have to do something like this."

"But in hats?" Piper shouted back, arching an eyebrow as her conical hat flopped around in the wind, "And robes?" To prove her point, she grabbed part of the billowing black robe she was wearing and shook it. She turned to Paige, was standing sagely with her robe completely covering her body as she stared into the bubbling cauldron, "Aren't you going to help me out here?"

"Nah, I'm over it." The witchlighter replied casually, "Like Phoebe said, it makes our powers stronger. You're just picking a petty fight to hold the inevitable off a little while longer."

"I am not!" She not retorted childishly.

"Oh yeah?" Paige smirked, holding out her hand to the eldest Charmed One as Phoebe took the other, "Prove it."

"…Fine." Piper grumbled, taking Paige's hand before picking up the ominous black box that was on the ground next to her and holding it over the cauldron. It seemed so small and simple. It was hard to believe that this box contained the most destructive force ever to be known in this world. "Are we ready?" She breathed, earning slow, firm nods from both of her siblings before she dropped the Hollow into the cauldron and grabbed Phoebe's hand, completing their triad.

"Hear now, the words of witches…" Their trio of voices melded into a haunting chorus as they began to chant the spell that had granted them their powers in the first place, "… the secrets we hid in the night. The oldest of gods are invoked here; the great work of magic is sought…" There was a deep rumbling from within the cauldron. The smoke began to thicken, blanketing all three Charmed Ones and momentarily blinding them. Each of them only knew her sisters were there now because they were holding hands, "In this night, and in this hour…" A brilliant flash of light flew from the stone basin and high into the sky, penetrating the clouds and creating a massive column of golden energy that reached into the heavens for all of San Francisco to see. "We call upon the ancient power…" The three witches suddenly burst into particles of sparkling light and entered the column that stood in the centre of them, the last part of the spell becoming an echo as it reached its climax, "Bring your power to we sisters three, we want the power…" Their disembodied voices now bellowed out across the Bay, making building foundations shake, the ocean ripple, and the very bridge on which stood tremble in their might.

"…Give us the power!"

* * *

"My God…"

They stood upon the edge of a twisted kingdom. A large castle-like structure lay far in front of them at the end of the long and winding path the Charmed Ones stood on. At first, it seemed rather whimsical in its design, with turrets sticking out at peculiar angles that defied the laws of physics, but on closer inspection, it was far more sinister. There were hundreds upon of hundreds of the columns, making the large building look like a gathering of lethal stone spikes. Paige turned around, only to see that the path they were on disintegrated into nothing but dust just behind where they had materialized, letting whoever was foolish enough to fall land straight into the mass of cracked, broken, small buildings that stretched as far as I the eye could see in every direction before the stench of death and mist of stale spirits swept over them, clouding them from view. It was a dead world. A world of long lost civilizations, all consumed by the Hollow.

Piper silently wriggled out of her flowing black cloak, folding it neatly and laying it down gently on the cold path beneath her. She took off her conical hat and sat it atop the folded garment, as if it was some kind of memorial statue for someone who had died. Her sisters quietly followed suit, only not so tidily. Phoebe, deciding she wanted to test the world around her, threw her Wiccan garbs into the dead city that lay below. There was silence all around her, so she had expected to hear some kind of faint ruffling when they hit the bottom, but instead, both hat and cloak fell into the mist below without a sound, with Phoebe never to know their fate.

"I did some reading in the book last night when we were researching…" Paige admitted. All three of them noted that her voice sounded hollow. "Apparently, the Hollow took many races into extinction when it was at large. I'm guessing if it was able to corrupt the ancient elementals, then it was able to corrupt everything else it swallowed too."

"So, what are you saying?" Phoebe asked in return, noting that her voice sounded just as dead as her little sister's.

"I'm not saying anything. We just need to be on the lookout. That's all."

"Let's get this over with…" Piper muttered, turning on her heel and beginning to walk towards the epicentre of this misery.

Their limbs felt heavier as they walked in their death march. Every step was a struggle; every swing of the arm would threaten to take away their balance. It was an odd sensation. They felt like the living dead. Their spirits were perfectly fine and intact, but with each step, their bodies became more and more like walking corpses. As they reached the entrance of the structure, Phoebe turned back to see how much they had walked, only to see that the path had vanished behind them. There was no going back now.

They heard a shriek of fright come from inside the entrance. Phoebe and Paige exchanged a silent look of shock themselves before realising that Piper had gone on without them. Cursing their oldest sister's desire to rush on ahead in order to end the whole situation quicker, the two younger Charmed Ones sped into the entrance to find Piper duelling with two massive stone golems.

"Stone demons!" She screamed, her voice sounding like a wail of despair, "They just came out of the wall and attacked!" The eldest Charmed One managed to phase out just in time as a rocky fist the size of a boulder swung at her head, letting it continue to swing until it crashed into the stone demon that was at Piper's other side, sending shards of rock flying everywhere and practically shredding the witch's face from their velocity as she took a breath and lost her intangibility. "A little help here, ladies!"

"Hang on, Piper!" Phoebe shouted back, turning to Paige in desperation, "How the hell do we fight demons that are glorified brick walls?"

"They're not made of stone." The witchlighter retorted calmly, cringing when Piper managed to dodge another blow out of sheer luck and use the stone demons' strength against them. "I remember reading a blurb about them in the book. Stone demons are nothing but spirits that have the power to animate and inhabit rock. Use your powers to expel them from the stone!"

Not even thinking about her own safety, Phoebe shot up into the air, levitating at the height of the creatures' heads before shooting a bright psionic blast into each of their minds. There was a duo of shrieks that sounded liked death cries before the golems went limp and suddenly toppled to the ground with a rumble, leaving two black blurs that had been floating in their place to head deeper into the castle at a great speed to escape the witch that had disempowered them so easily.

Phoebe lowered herself to the floor gently, casting her gaze forward as Paige helped Piper to her feet, "Is everybody okay?"

"Yeah…" Piper grumbled in response, turning on her youngest sister with an arched eyebrow, "I'm going to take a wild guess here and suggest that those stone demons are just the tip of the iceberg when you were talking about corrupt races."

"Gee, you think?" Paige snapped back, shaking her head as the three of them regrouped. She raised her hand to her sibling's face, a golden glow coming from her hand as she healed the welts on her face that had been caused by flying rubble, "Piper, what the hell were you thinking? I know you want this to be over, but I also know you'd like to be _around_ for whenever it's over."

"Yeah, you're no good to us dead, honey. You can't just wander off on your own like that."

"Okay, I get it, I'm sorry. I just got a little carried away." She confessed, looking slightly disappointed in herself as she brushed off some of the dirt that had got onto her clothes during her dodging attempts. "Let's just keep going. I'll take the lead since I have the most offensive powers…"

Paige arched an eyebrow at this, "Could have fooled me with the way you fought those stone demons…"

Her elder sister charged on, ignoring her, "… And Phoebe, you bring up the rear and keep your psychic radar open for any surprise attacks. Paige, you stay in between us. Not only are you our little sister, but you're also the only person capable of helping us if we get seriously injured, and since you can't heal yourself, we need to keep you safe. Plus, if you're standing in between both of us, you can reach us easier if we need to orb out in an emergency."

"Okay."

"Sounds good." Phoebe added.

"Alright then… let's end this."

* * *

Pamela smiled proudly as she heard the last words of her aunts' spell boom across the city. She'd had to close her eyes against the blinding light coming from the top of the bridge, but the fact that she had heard their voices seem to calm the shaking in her that was making the window pane quake due to her hand being on it. In a way, the witch felt guilty for what she was doing. Her and her uncles had decided to split up, and they had all vanished, leaving her to go where she wanted. Or, it seemed, stay were she wanted. The Manor had always been a safe haven to her, no matter how far she moved away from it, it was always there. Pamela could only hope that it would continue to work this way during whatever battle she would get into today.

With a deep sigh, she turned around and faced the Book of Shadows which sat on its altar in an almost defiant way. Pamela had tried everything to move it and get it out of the house so it wouldn't be damaged in a fight, but no matter what spell she cast, or what way she tried to take it out physically, the tome just wouldn't budge from the Manor's four walls unless it was in the hands of a Charmed One. She should have asked Piper to take it out of the house before she left, but then that would have given away the fact that she was still staying in the house after they had all split up.

"Quiet in this house… It's a little terrifying."

Pamela's head shot up to find Annabelle standing in the middle of the room, looking around the attic curiously as she was still enamoured by the eerie silence that filled the Manor. The first thing she noticed about the ex-mercenary was the menacing looking scythe she held within her loosely crossed arms, making Pamela's eyes narrow suspiciously, "I felt the wave of power coming from the city, and when I got closer, I saw the light. It could only be your aunts."

"Yeah… But what are you doing here with that?" Pamela asked, eyeing the scythe apprehensively when the blonde shifted it into her right hand, making it move through the air and glint in the light in the process.

"I'm here to fight." She said firmly, noticing the melancholy expression on the younger witch's face and frowning inquisitively, "What's wrong with you? You're usually pumped before a fight. And…" The ex-mercenary looked around the attic was again, settling on the open door that connected the room to the rest of the silent house, "Where is everyone else? What about Leo and everyone?"

"They're gone." Pamela replied sadly, "We found out that four of Hollow's servants would be coming out to attack us, so we split up so they would be easier to defeat. Aidan went somewhere with the other elementals, and Brennan found some of his old mutant buddies to help him out. I dunno where Leo's gone, but he can self-heal and can always orb out if things get too dangerous, so…"

"You're alone…" Annabelle finished for her gravely, shooting the girl a sympathetic look when her head was bowed to the floor, as she knew Pamela wouldn't stand for any kind of pity if she saw it, no matter how scared she was. The two of them were a lot alike in that sense. Even more so as they had both come to rely on other people, and being alone again wasn't an easy adjustment. "Well, you're not alone now. Leo can take care of himself, and the other guys already have backup, so I'll stay here with you and fight whatever comes at us."

"You really don't have to do-,"

"Be quiet. I'm staying."

The witch opened her mouth to protest again, before letting a small laugh escape from her lips as her mouth dissolved into a smile, "Thanks… And, hey, don't take this the wrong way, but you're a lot more cheerful than the last time I saw you."

Annabelle nodded her head slightly, "I have your aunts to thank for that. I have my family back, and the worst ten years of my life are now over. And, you know, I'm the high priestess of one of the most skillful mercenary covens in the world. It's hard at times, but it's enjoyable. You really do come from some amazing people for them to have given me all that."

"Yeah… I have absolutely no idea where I'd be without family right now." The Halliwell witch said ruefully, her thoughts going through the many grisly scenarios her imagination had conjured up. She was ready to start another topic of conversation when a shrill, piercing alarm echoed throughout the house, making both witches flinch and become immediately alert.

"…What is that?"

Pamela looked forward distantly as the noise began to fade away. She knew this was the start of her contribution to this battle. The only question that remained to her was whether or not she would end up contributing her life. She finally made eye contact with Annabelle, her eyes becoming as cold and sharp as glaciers. "It's the smoke alarm in the kitchen…" She muttered lowly, heading towards the attic steps with the blonde in tow.

When they reached the bottom of the stairs, the entire ground floor of the Manor was masked in a thin haze of smoke. The two looked around, seeing nothing out of the ordinary until they turned towards the dining room to see massive plumes of coal black smoke billowing out from the kitchen doorway. Pamela's heart began to race as they neared the entrance, trying to hold her breath against the torrents of smoke that poured out in front of her. A wave of heat hit her as she could now see the entire kitchen had been lost in a raging inferno, yet something had survived within the hellish flames. And it was staring right at her through the thick clouds of black that she was continually being barraged with. She had no doubt that this was the fire elemental.

Mars had at least two feet of a height advantage over her. The elemental's rocky skin reminded her of the Firestarters that she had fought a few weeks ago, as if this entire being was made from a volcano as hot magma flowed angrily through his interior, shining through the cracks in his stony body. Two large, curved horns of the same texture protruded from his head while it seemed that hoofed feet kept him from feeling the pain of the flames that licked around his ankles. Pamela could only assume it had been centuries of corruption that could turn a human being into something like this. Something that resembled the devil himself.

His large physique, however, didn't impair his agility one bit it seemed. Pamela barely had time to raised her hands and raised a telekinetic shield from a massive jet of fire flew towards her, the sheer force of it colliding with her psychic barrier causing her to fly back into the wall that was to the side of the sunroom entrance, cracking the plastering in the process. She stood there with her hands up, her fire inches away from incinerating her. The witch could already feel the skin on her palms beginning to burn from the sheer proximity of the insatiable flames that threatened to consume her.

Suddenly, the flames changed direction and shot up upwards, freeing Pamela from her trap and allowing her to flee towards the foyer as the dining room ceiling was hit by the massive plume of flames as they mushroomed outwards, setting roof of the room alight almost immediately, along with the curtains that hung at the window, allowing the fire to spread. She was able to see that Annabelle, thanks to her control over fire, had rescued her from being burned alive. "It's not safe down here anymore! We have to get-!"

Annabelle was cut off when a large, dark blur suddenly flew from the flames that had enveloped the dining room within seconds, and threw her across the hallway and through the front doors, landing a pile of splintered wood and shattered glass as the doors gave way to the fast weight that had just flown through them. Pamela inhaled, ready to release a cloud of ice in Mars' face, before she was severely winded as a rocky fist collided with her face, sending her across the middle living room and giving her a hard landing on the sunroom floor, her body skidding along the smooth surface until she hit the wicker sofa.

A stream of particles flew to her side and came together to form Annabelle, "C'mon! We have to get upstairs now!" She shouted urgently, her face covered in small cuts and welts from her trip through the front doors.

"No…!" Pamela protested shakily as she was pulled to her feet, seeing her family's beloved house, the one that had been theirs for centuries, swallowed by the flames that had now covered the kitchen, the dining room, and where now spreading to the rest of the ground floor. "We… We have to put the fire out!" She looked around wildly before her eyes settled on Mars, who had raised his hands once again to create another obliterating geyser of fire. Knowing that a simple breath of frost wouldn't stop it, she raised both her hands once again as the flames flew towards them. But this time, she was ready. As the jet of fire neared, it suddenly began to fall back at the end of the plume, reigning back down on its thrower and causing Mars to plow into the wall underneath the staircase.

"Stairs! _Now!_" Annabelle bellowed, grabbing Pamela's hand and bolting for the stairs as Mars started to recover from the attack and give chase, while the memories of the Manor's ground floor went up in smoke.

* * *

It didn't even bother Leo as he felt a little of the ocean's spray fly up onto his lap. He actually found it relaxing to sit on top of the one the many rocks that jutted out towards the ocean at the beach, and just get gradually soaked by the tiny droplets of water that would assault him from him the crashing waves. This was where he came to escape the din of the Manor. Whenever he was on the brink of letting people know that he felt the world was about to come crashing down around his ears, he came here to drown out the darkness. Leo had always operated like this. Never showing his loved ones that he had emotional flaws. He had to remain the calm, rational voice of reason and not have a meltdown when it seemed everyone else was. It was the rhythmic noise of the tide crashing against the rocks, then pulling back before repeating the process all over again. Right now, it was the only thing that kept him from orbing away, grabbing all his family members and sealing all of them away in some impenetrable realm where they would never be hurt.

"Leo! What are you doing here?"

Leo jumped and opened his eyes, finding Piper staring at him incredulously from the sand below with her hands on her hips. "Leo, please, we need you. Pam's getting seriously hurt back at the Manor. That fire elemental is ripping through her and I don't know much longer she can last."

The Elder stood up, surveying his wife with extreme confusion. He had felt the power of Piper and her sisters destroying the barrier around the Hollow and entering its depths. He had even seen the light such a powerful spell had generated. Why was she here now? "Piper, you can't be here! You need to be with your sisters so you can vanquish the Hollow." He insisted, jumping down from the rocks and onto the wet sand so he was standing with her, "That's the most important thing. I'll take care of Pam."

Piper nodded slowly, beginning to turn away from her husband, "…Okay. Be care-,"

She didn't get a chance to finish her sentence. Leo had raised his fists, voltage pulsing through his arms before two powerful bolts of lightning struck Piper in the chest and sent her flying into the air. She was thrown back far, eventually landing with a muffled thud on some damp sand just as the tide came in, completely soaking her and, oddly enough, making her skin immediately turn a sickly blue.

"You think that after _fourteen_ years I don't know my own wife?" Leo bellowed angrily, glaring at Piper as she stared up at him through the sopping mess her hair had become. "The real Piper would have blown me up for even _suggesting_ that she go back to a fight while a member of her family was dying. Family is the most important thing to her. She doesn't give a _crap_ about the Hollow. Everything she does is for the people she loves!" He narrowed his eyes stepping forward and raising his arms to attack once more, "You're _not_ my wife, and since water is the symbolic element for illusion, you might as well show your true self, Mercury."

Piper bared her teeth as she got up from the sand, her body still twitching slightly from the electric attack she had endured. "A smart Elder…" She said a choked, straggly voice that wasn't her own. "Now, there's a new one." Her whole body suddenly became water, allowing her shape to change and become the ancient water elemental's true form.

The water grew upwards a few feet as the bottom part slithered outwards onto the sand and flailed around viciously like a snake's tail, disturbing the sand and throwing it into the air. Eight spokes of water flew out from out from the main body, four on each side before the creature finally took its corporeal form. Cold, aquamarine eyes stared out at Leo maniacally from an equally cold looking scaly face. The eight protrusions that had formed in the water had ended up resembling octopus tentacles that thrashed around just as much as the dangerous looking tail. The entire creature seemed to be some kind of sea snake, all the way up to the neck where it took on the form something that resembled a grotesque human. The serpent's tongue, appropriately forked, darted around and looked just as vicious as the elemental's tentacles and tail. Its eyes rolled around in its head and a light smattering of scales slowly trailed down the body, becoming thicker and harder as they got to the tail. It was a disgusting being, and Leo found it hard to believe that it had once been a blonde, fair skinned child.

"I'm warning you." Leo said menacingly, electricity racing up and down his arms once again, "I'm giving you once chance to yield to the world's changes and finally move on to afterlife. That is about as merciful as I get. If you don't comply…"

Mercury let out a choked cackle at the elder's warning, "You'll what?" She spat, saliva dripping from her sharp teeth, "You'll… vanquish me?" At this, her laughter increased furthermore before one of her tentacles suddenly shot out, inexplicably extending at the same time and colliding with Leo's chest. The elder was thrown into the air and shoved backwards at a magnificent rate, orbing out just in time before the tentacle that was pushing him hit the rock he had been sitting on and reduced it to dust.

"You'll have to do a lot better than that." He growled as he rematerialized behind the mutated water elemental, throwing as much lightning as he could and making Mercury elicit a eardrum piercing wail of pain as his battle finally commenced.

* * *

"Well, it's official." Jesse said loudly as he strode through Sanctuary towards Brennan and Lexa, who had been having a conversation at the main steps of the large establishment. They had switched on to the backup generator to put all the power into the many defense systems that riddled Sanctuary's walls, so nothing but the dim lighting of a few small bulbs throughout the entire cave brought them their sight, "The place is at maximum security. It'll take a hell of a lot of power for something to get in and get out, and we should be able to use some of the intruder traps to our advantage as well. As long as you guys can hold back whatever comes through from the main computer, then I can use it to help."

There was a whooshing sound behind them as Shalimar descended from the support beams she had been prowling on in the darkness above them, her eyes glowing as she made a perfect landing. "I know you guys probably hate this darkness, but speaking as feral who is particularly sensitive to light, this is absolute heaven. I can fight better like this…" She growled predatorily with a smirk, sauntering up to the group so they stood like four points of a diamond, only with Lexa sitting on the stairs.

"The Mutant X team all reunited then…" Brennan mused aloud, before bursting out into a grin. "Am I the only one who thinks back of those days of chasing mad scientists, stopping crazy mutants and corrupt governments as simple compared to what we fight now?" He leaned against the wall, folding his arms, "I mean, we've went from Gabriel Ashlocke to the ultimate magical power that has the ability to swallow worlds. We've evolved if you think about it."

"And we didn't even have to grow tails to do it." Lexa added cheerfully, before grimacing slightly and turning to Shalimar, "Although, let's face it, that possibility is a lot stronger for certain people than it is for others." She added sarcastically, chuckling when the feral sent her a playful glare for her animal jibe. "But seriously, we're lucky that our genes lasted this long. I would have pegged us all for death a few years ago. Part of me was at peace with that, but now…" She looked into the distance, shaking her head at her past thoughts, "I have so much to live for. Lilly… Her father… Who, by the way, I still can't remember. I had far too much to drink that night and he didn't even stick around in the morning."

"Funny." Jesse commented dryly, giving her a large grin as she placed a hand on his shoulder from her seat on the stairway. "Speaking of Lilly… Adam said he was going to get both of them outta here, right?"

"Yeah. And given the fact that he has disappearing down to an art form, I don't think I'll doubt him." Lexa replied ruefully, "What about Connor and Faith?"

"With my sisters." Brennan cast his gaze to the floor as he spoke, it just now hitting him that handing over his children to Nelle and the others may have been the last time he would ever see the two of them ever again. This then led on to thoughts of Phoebe, thoughts which he was quick to squash by jumping back into the conversation, "Yeah, Wisconsin is about as far away from the action as you can get, and since we're moving up there afterwards, it's a good time for the kids to get used to the house."

"Well," Shalimar said, "I guess that's something to look to forward…" Her voice trailed off into a whisper and her gaze became distant. Brennan spoke to inquire on her weird behaviour, only to have her silence him with a flicker of her fierce amber eyes. "Jess, get to the main computer now. We're about to have company." She said darkly, her eyes still glowing in the limited light as her friend ran off to the laboratory where the main controls were kept.

"What do you hear?" Lexa asked softly. Brennan couldn't tell whether she was talking quietly because Shalimar was trying to listen to something else, or if it was just out of fear.

"Wind." She replied, her jaw clenching, "It sounds like a hurricane. I can hear it wearing down the rock outside, and since that's something that usually takes centuries to do, I think its safe to say that we're dealing with-," She spun around, staring at the blank rocky wall next to them as her eyes reverted to normal, "_Get out of the way!_"

All three mutants moved from the spot immediately thanks to their respective powers. Brennan flew up to the main walkway, electric clouds pulsing from his palms and excelling his flight. Shalimar gracefully jumped upwards, flipping in the air to increase her speed before landing on the higher level that led to the walkway. Lexa, who had moved faster than both of them, reappeared between her friends' landing spots in a flash of light before they had even reached them just as a large chunk of the main wall burst into dust, letting a small stream of sunlight through before it was instantly eclipsed by whatever had made the hole in the mountain.

Had one of the Charmed Ones been here, they would have compared Jupiter's appearance to the creatures that had been stuck in the rock at Journey's End. She had taken the form of a scantily clad, lilac-skinned woman, her chest covered by two strips of fabric that crossed over her and presumably tied around her back. She had no legs; instead it looked like a large crystal had consumed her bottom half, and gave her the ability to float as a substitute for walking. Her arms were stretched out to her sides as she was on a crucifix, and in a way, she was. Just after they reached the elbow, her arms melted into the golden metal of a giant ornament on her back that resembled a wheel, and at the end of each massive spoke, the ancient symbol for wind shone an angry purple. It truly was like she had been strung up on a massive wheel. And finally, the detail of her appearance that chilled Brennan the most; was the fact that she also had a strip of fabric tied around her head, covering her eyes. It made Jupiter seem even more dangerous.

Shalimar was first to launch an attack. She pounced from the higher floor, descending upon her opponent as Jupiter opened her mouth, shocking everyone with what happened next. She began to sing the Angel's Melody. A loud, deep note boomed from her mouth, sending pulse after pulse of gusts into Sanctuary. The feral instantly screamed in pain, her heightened hearing unable to take the volume and tone of the song before a powerful shockwave of wind made her fly back from where she had come from, landing on the smooth floor with a sickening crack as Brennan and Lexa fell to their knees, hands planted firmly on their ears as Jupiter continued to sing her deadly song. Sparks flew from pieces of equipment around the elemental that could no longer take the air pressure she was emitting.

"Jesse!" Brennan bellowed, hoping his comlink still worked despite the signal interference that was being caused by their enemy, "Do something! Now!"

As he spoke, two metallic probes seemed to fly out of nowhere, speeding towards Jupiter and exploding underneath the air pressure that she exuded. Brennan cringed in disappointment as his head felt like it was about to split, before he realized what the probes had done. An electric field had burst forth from each of the silver spheres, trapping Jupiter in a painful voltage cage and instantly stopping her singing.

It was time to fight back.

* * *

"_What?_"

Maxwell could only shrug apologetically at Aidan's indignation, slightly hiding under his shaggy black hair as he could see that his friend was definitely in a 'kill the messenger' mood. "Those are their words, not mine." The fire elemental said, keeping his expression passive as his fellow elemental's eyes bugged out. It seemed not even the calming hum of the Angel's Melody within the chamber would sooth him; "They told me that ultimate battles weren't part of being an elemental. They aren't friends with us, so they don't really give a crap about our safety, and they're basically running for cover. It looks like it's just you and me unless you want to drag our four year old earth elemental into a battle."

"Damn the Sylph!" Aidan fumed, shaking his head at the thought of the trio of air sprites just vanishing into the ether, refusing to help them fight. He kicked a stray stone on the large plateau, oddly not even hearing a splash as it fell into the dark water that filled the elemental chamber, "If the ancient fire of water elemental shows up, we're screwed, because only one of us will be able to fight without making them stronger with our own powers." He walked to the edge of the platform, sitting down and letting his legs dangle off the side as Maxwell joined him. "This is a battle for the whole world. Elementals are basically the world split in four. We should all be here. Matt should be here… Grant should be here… Skye should be here…" He gave himself a moment to mourn previous elementals.

"The only earth elemental I know of is Lorna, so I can't comment on those guys, but yeah, I miss Skye." Maxwell agreed sadly, looking down into the black, murky water, "She would have us all pumped up for this fight… Well, not the way she was near the end, but like when I met her. She helped me get control of my powers and made me feel like part of the team."

"Yeah… Skye helped out Grant as well. She could always put Danielle in her place; she was like a daughter to Matt-,"

"Would you guys stop talking about me like I'm dead?"

Both elementals jumped and turned around to see Skye standing behind them, a broad smile on her face as her former partners got up from their sitting positions to gawp at her sudden appearance in the elemental chamber. "Okay, if this is how depressing the elementals have become since I left, I'm starting to feel a little guilty for apparently taking all the fun with me." She said, shaking her head at the two men with a grin.

"What… What are you even doing here?" Aidan asked, aghast, "You don't have any powers. You shouldn't have been able to get in here."

"Actually I do have powers… at least for today." Skye replied, narrowing her eyes in thought, "It's a little tricky, and I don't really understand it myself, but the Elders got wind –no pun intended– of the Sylph's reluctance to battle, so they took the elemental powers from them and temporarily gave them back to me so I could help you guys." She cast her eyes to her side, as if she expecting something, "And of course, I had to escort a certain someone here as well…"

A bright swirl of orange-tinted lights spun into creation at the girl's side, a figure slowly beginning to form before they were was a small flash of light that left Grant Thoroughway standing in their place. The now deceased earth elemental remained incorporeal for a brief moment until a band of bright energy traveled down his body, slowly making him solid. "Consider me another gift from the Elders." He said with a grin while Aidan and Maxwell stood, barely able to take in the presence of the two people before them.

"They took Lorna's earth elemental powers from Piper before she went to fight the Hollow." Skye explained, still mused by the stunned looks on her friends' faces, "He has them for the time being until he gets sent back to the afterlife."

"Right…" Aidan murmured, giving both of them a wide eyed stare, "Emma made it to you this time, right?" He asked, casting his gaze towards Grant. The last time they had seen each other was Christmas of nearly two years ago now, and back then, that was the first hint Aidan had received that the psionic was still alive, "Her soul wasn't hijacked and reborn again?"

"She made it." Grant replied with a reassuring nod.

"Good. She deserves some peace after all this time."

"One question…" Maxwell began, frowning as his eyes flickered between the two new arrivals in the chamber, "I thought the key to the elementals was balance. You know, that we all cancel each other out if we fight. And as far as I know; and as far as I was taught…" He shot a thankful look at Skye, who smiled in return, "I thought we always have to be made up of two men, and two women. Aren't we a little out of balance with this setup?"

"We can't send powers back that far down the ancestral elemental lines though." Skye answered, "The water elementals have been men for centuries, the wind elemental is already covered by my being a woman. Lorna can't fight, Piper's already dealing with the main enemy, and while your predecessor was a woman, she was also insane and a raging bitch. And I thought that _before_ she tried to kill Paige while she was in labour, not to mention Grant and me. Although…" She turned to Grant and Aidan, "If you guys want to send Maxwell packing, I'm sure we can get Danielle back here."

"_No!_" They both shouted in protest, each having a similar physical reaction to their revulsion and making Skye giggle.

The good mood was interrupted when a surge of light suddenly burst to life on the giant tablet that worked as a portal into the elemental chamber. For some reason, the Angel's Melody began to fade, and for once, there was complete silence within the cave. The walls stopped glowing with magic, either sucked dry of them somehow, or the magic had just fled, sensing danger. Either way, the lack of music was extremely disconcerting, and what appeared before them did nothing to calm the tense atmosphere.

An animated skeleton began to come through the portal. Slightly larger than most humans, it was nearly the height the portal tablet, causing the four elementals to stare up at its hollow face. It wore some kind of rusty, ceremonial helm on its head, with large spikes protruding from the spine of the headpiece and running all the way to the back. A large black cloak hung from its bony shoulders and swept behind it, looking like the entrance to oblivion with its all consuming darkness acting as a backdrop for the being. Instead of hands, massive two-pronged, skeletal claws hung the end of each wrist, making human looking remains look horribly mutated and extremely dangerous. Battle worn armour adorned the rest of the creature's body. It was rusty, and had many holes in it, showing the decaying bone underneath, but none of them doubted how effective the armour was in battle, as magic could do this: make the impossible possible. As it loomed over the four of them, it came clear to Aidan what ancient elemental they were dealing with. As it took the form of something that had decayed and returned to the ground, it had to the earth elemental, Venus.

"_Use the power."_

Aidan's heart skipped a beat as the voice echoed in his mind, "N-No!" He shouted, being the first to launch an attack against Venus as he sent a pulse of crushing water pressure tearing from his palm, colliding with the elemental's breastplate and dissipating into nothing, doing no damage and not even causing the target to stumble slightly. "We can't let it get past us! C'mon!"

The moment he spoke, Venus was hit with the triple threat of lightning, fire and sand that poured from his comrades' fingertips. Nearly any other being would have been obliterated by such an assault from this trio of powerful beings, yet Venus stood there, the sound of malevolent laughter eventually overpowering the crackling from the attack he was enduring. With one swish of the his cloak, the onslaught ceased immediately, as if it had all been absorbed by the black hole that was his cape. There was a glow within the cavities his eyes should have been before an odd sensation suddenly struck the elementals.

They all felt weightless, as if gravity had left them was allowing them to float in the air. It was only part of Venus' destructive attack as he then cast an anti-gravity field around the area, sending the four of them flying back in different directions and disturbing every speck of rock dust around him in the process. There was a crash, then a splash, before Aidan looked up from the plateau he had landed hard on to see that the portal tablet had been struck by the gravity field and fallen into the dark water below.

They were trapped now.

* * *

Paige let out a frustrated sigh as she walked slowly through the massive hall. Everything was in a bright green hue due to the night vision spell that they had cast on entering the large room, and despite the improvement in getting to know the area well, the spell hadn't helped them find their way out in the least. The gigantic expanse had rows and row of marble pillars that stretched up into the unseen ceiling, each of them damaged in some kind of way whether it was a series of cracks running all the way up the side or a large chunk of marble missing. Some had even collapsed completely and lay in pieces on the floor, shattered from the impact of falling to the ground, leaving the stumpy base. And yet, darkness surrounded them at every turn with no sign of an exit.

"You know, I brought some of those light potions in case we needed them." She spoke up, feeling her sisters' gaze upon her and feeling briefly freaked out by their fiercely glowing eyes as they turn to face her, "Maybe we should just crack one open and-,"

"No." Piper flattened her suggestion immediately, "I think we all remember the last time we used one of those potions. We had an entire legion of shadow demons on us in seconds. The night vision spell is safer, and it keeps us hidden…" She turned to Phoebe, who was looking straight up into the darkness above them, "What are you looking at?"

"Something's moving around up there…" She replied lowly, as if she was afraid of awaking whatever she sensed.

"What do you see? Or… sense?" Piper inquired.

"Uh… guys?"

"It's not human." Phoebe answered, "But past that, I don't know. It could be an imp or a golem for all I know."

"You guys…"

"Alright, let's just keeping moving then."

"Guys!"

"What?" Piper and Phoebe snapped in unison, swirling in their little sister's direction to face her with incredulous looks.

"Look…"

Following where Paige was pointing, the two older Charmed Ones looked to the ground and felt their hearts sink as they did so. The floor was ridden with dried in bloodstains, fragments of skeletal bone, and enormous scorch marks that stretched over thirty feet. All of this spread across every single part of the surface they could see before the floor itself vanished into the darkness. Now that they knew what to look for, they could also see large scorch marks on the broken ends of pillars, and that the cracks weren't cracks at all. They were _scratches_.

"You don't think that…?"

No one answered Piper's question, allowing her voice to fade away as they looked down at the bone fragments below in quiet horror. If their suspicions were correct, then they were truly out of their league. The Book of Shadows had never provided any information on them, and the issue had never arose outside of one isolated event that couldn't be held as one to take any knowledge from. Silence, followed by an echoed tapping noise above them. It was on the move.

A terrifying roar ripped through the massive hall above them, causing the ground to shake and ancient dust to fall from every pillar that stood around them. The Charmed Ones looked up, and the night vision spell instantly wore off as their eyes were dazzled by a flash of light. It had achieved its purpose of providing sight where there was no light, as now, a giant mushroom cloud of fierce fire descended from the invisible ceiling, illuminating the space in which they stood in a column of dim light while all three witches stood, paralyzed by fright.

"_Run!_" Piper bellowed, finally breaking the horrified trance her sisters were in and causing them to sprint madly away from the spot the fire was going to collide with the ground. They didn't dare turn back in fear of it slowing down their speed. A wave of heat hit their backs as the flames hit the floor, spreading out due to having nowhere to go. Piper, who had been leading the three of them, suddenly dove behind a large pillar, her younger siblings following suit and looking back in the direction they had run from, temporarily safe behind their tall protector.

Small fires that still burned on the ground, dramatically lighting up the dragon in a menacing glow. A low growl rumbled its throat, sending vibrations through the ground and shivers down the Charmed Ones' spines. Its lemon yellow eyes with black slits scanned the ground beneath its sharp talons wildly, disappointed that there wasn't three charred corpses waiting to be devoured. It squinted against the glow from the flames, clearly not used to direct eye contact with light. Thick, turquoise scales covered the beast completely, shimmering in the firelight as it made slow, deliberate movements in the direction its prey had moved in. Large nostrils flexed at the end of its harsh looking snout, jets of smoke pouring from the two holes as well as through its clenched teeth, every vicious point in its mouth looking like a thick ivory tusk of an elephant. It kept its massive, bat-like wings spread like a radar, sensing where its targets had fled as it slowly made its way towards where the three witches were hiding.

"How do we fight a _dragon_?" Paige hissed, afraid to blink in case it cost her her life.

"We've done it before, haven't we?" Phoebe whispered back.

"No, Wyatt did. And that was also because he conjured it! Not something like this!"

Piper couldn't even hear her sisters' arguing as she peered out into the darkness behind them, her eyes settling on what she had been looking for after a matter of seconds. She spoke to them without even taking her gaze off the broken pillar, afraid that if she did, she would lose it and have to waste time finding it again. "I think I have an idea…"

The dragon's eyes widened when Phoebe suddenly walked out from behind one of the pillars to its side. The beast reared up slightly, surprised by this turn of events as it surveyed the witch calmly. She stared up at its frightful eyes, trying to get a hold of the shaking that had overtaken her body, "Alright, you overgrown salamander!" A sphere of white light began to hover above her head, "Come and get me!" The psionic blast flew from her forehead, colliding with the leathery skin between the dragon's eyes and eliciting an enraged roar just as Phoebe turned on her heel and fled.

The middle Charmed One let out a scream as she heard one of the pillars behind her shatter to pieces due to the dragon galloping at her at an incredible speed, crushing anything in its path as it chased its prey. She searched wildly for the pillar that she was supposed to run to, finally spotting it and increasing her speed as a cloud of dust descended upon her as her pursuer crashed through another obstacle. "Piper!" She shouted, reaching her destination and rushing behind the pillar to find her sisters crouched behind it, "Now, now, now, now, _now!_"

After that frenzied prompt, Piper threw out her hands, instantly causing an explosion at the base of the broken pillar. The three witches turned away to avoid being injured by flying pieces of marble before she blasted it again, making it sway even more. The dragon was now only a few feet away from now, its jaw lowered, with a light beginning to grow at the back of its throat before a gout of fire tore from its jagged mouth. Piper, thinking fast, grabbed her sisters' hands and took a breath, massing them out just as the wall of flames collided against them. "_Paige!_" She screamed, not knowing how much longer she could protect them against the inferno.

Paige bellowed in agony as she exerted her will on the broken pillar before her. There was a series of short cracks, a sickening squelch, then more cracks. The loud roar of the fire instantly died, leaving the Charmed Ones standing in a cloud of heat as the dragon toppled to the ground with an ear shattering crash, sending up a shockwave of dust as it fell. The hall returned to its silence while the trio stared at the remnants of their victory.

Phoebe surveyed the fallen creature, silently impressed by her little sister's efforts, "Good job…" She said with an eyebrow raised, mostly in shock, but also in slight terror at the bloody scene that now lay in front of them.

Piper slowly walked around the corpse of their opponent. Paige had managed to send the pillar through the hard scales on the belly, run it completely through the dragon's insides before it sprouted out at the top, viciously misshaping the beast's spine in the process and drenching its back in its own blood. The eldest witch also noticed she was standing in a puddle of the crimson liquid as she looked down, seeing the gaping entry wound as the pillar was now fully sheathed in the dragon's stomach. "Are you okay?" She asked Paige, who was standing with her head in her hands, practically doubled over.

"Yeah…" She breathed back uncertainly, "Just don't ask me to lift anything that heavy again. I thought my head was going to explode." The witchlighter dropped her hands to her sides, letting out a tired sigh, "I really don't think I can do that again."

"Well, in that case, let's get the hell outta here." Piper advised lowly, still transfixed by the dead creature. "If dragons were consumed into extinction by the Hollow, then I'm pretty sure there'll be more where he came from if we stick around, and I'm out of ideas of how to kill them if Paige can't move the pillars."

"I agree." Phoebe answered, nodding her head, "Let's just try and find our way outta here. We'll stick to the pillars so we have _some_ kind of protection in case… What are you doing?"

Her question was directed at Paige, who had crouched down next to the copious amounts of blood pouring from the dragon, phial in hand, and was trying to fill it with the thick substance. She looked up at her sisters' incredulous expressions, shrugging innocently, "Do you realize how rare a potion ingredient dragon's blood is? The only reason some dealers find scales is because they drop off as the dragon grows and they last for centuries. You can't beat the fresh stuff." She corked the phial after filling it, bringing another one out of her pocket, "Hey, think yourselves lucky. If I had the means to carry it, I would be orbing its heart out here in a heartbeat… no pun intended."

"You are such a vulture sometimes." Phoebe said, shaking her head "This may beat the time you took grimlock eyes to experiment with a protection potion."

"Hey, that was karmic retribution for those guys." She replied, finishing off the second small bottle with a smile, "Corked!"

"Great." Piper responded scathingly, "Now, put a cork on your inner potions mistress and let's go!"

* * *

Pamela felt another dagger of ice pierce her heart as she watched one of Annabelle's energy balls tear through a dresser that stood outside Piper's room in the first floor hallway. They had both learned during Mars' ascent on the stairs that attacking his infallible body directly was doing nothing to damage him, so they had taken to blowing up anything that was around him in a vain attempt to slow the elemental down. Despite their best efforts, however, Mars continued to pursue them, the unbelievable heat pouring from his body causing the walls to ignite with flames wherever they went. The Manor was lost.

Hiding in the doorway to the attic steps, Pamela flung herself out and threw her hand towards her enemy, flicking her fingers in and out in rapid succession to cause multiple explosions to detonate against Mars' mountain-like chest. The air was dense with smoke, causing both witches to burst into coughing fits at random intervals. Their hair was sticking to their face from the heat, and even though they couldn't be sure due to their concentration being elsewhere, an odd groan reverberated around them, as if the Manor's foundations were no longer holding against this fiery might.

"This is a lost cause! We have to get out of here now! It's not safe!" Annabelle bellowed over the roaring flames as Pamela's eyes closed for a brief moment. Her whole body glowed as she sent an astral pulse rocketing forth from her soul, colliding with Mars and knocking him back into the wall, cracking the plaster and nearly making a clear hole into Wyatt's bedroom. The mercenary grabbed Pamela's wrist as she came to from her unconscious state, preparing to get them to safety, before the young witch ripped her wrist from her grasp.

"No!" Pamela shouted back, briefly turning to Annabelle as Mars began to recover. Her face was bright red from a mixture of heat and anger, with a thin veil of smoky dirt darkening her skin and a burn on her cheek where the elemental had hit her downstairs, "If the Manor's going down, then it's sure as hell taking this son of a bitch with it!"

"Look out!"

Pamela turned around just in time to see Mars looming over her. He was ready to shatter her skull with one punch before the witch blew out a cloud of cryokinetic energy in his face, stunning him with the fierce cold and cooling him down for one fatal second. With this distraction, she plowed the heel of her hand into his chest and, with the help her advanced telekinesis, sent him flying through the heat weakened wall behind him to land on the wardrobe in Chris' room with an ear shattering crash. She spun on Annabelle, grabbing her hand and running up the stairs as the fire began to spread to them as it had to the rest of the house, "Attic! Now!"

She could hear sirens close by. Of course someone had called the fire department. The whole house was being consumed by flames by the middle of day. Her heart hate quickened, this news spurring her on. If firefighters came in here, they could be either be overwhelmed by the supernatural fire, or be slaughtered by Mars. This couldn't happen. The elemental had been toying with them so far. Not going as fast as he could, not showing them his full strength. He was drawing this out; he had deliberately cornered them to get some kind of thrill from the kill. It was then Pamela realized that with sick satisfaction that he really should have just killed them on the ground floor, because now that they were in the only safe room in the house, her fight or flight response was blazing. The latter option had been thrown out years ago the first time she'd had to protect herself. There was only one thing left to do.

Fight.

* * *

"Fuck!"

Leo gritted his teeth as he scrambled over the slippery rocks, cursing loudly as he lost his grip and nearly smashed his head against a seaweed covered boulder. If he wasn't giving up his power the moment he had finished this fight, he wouldn't have swore as it was extremely unbecoming of an Elder. But he didn't care anymore. All he wanted was to see the charred remains of that disgusting sea serpent lying crippled on a bed of spiky rocks. After being slammed viciously numerous times against the cliff face that overlooked the beach, he had finally been able to fight back, blasting Mercury high into the air in the direction of the rocks along the coast, and out of his sight. The only question that remained was whether or not he had bested the vicious elemental at her own game.

"Dad! Is that you?"

Leo narrowed his eyes suspiciously when he suddenly saw Wyatt's head pop up from behind a few rocks in front of him, already tightening his hands into fists so he could attack at any moment, waiting for the façade of his son to fade, "I came to help you fight!" He said defiantly as he stood up on the rock proudly, making his father lower his hands. Wyatt had wanted to fight along with them, after all. Could this really be him?

His question was answered when Mercury rose high above Wyatt, looming over the child's back without him even realizing with all eight tentacles outstretched and ready to attack, "Wyatt! Look out!" Leo was able to raise his hand just in time and unleash a thunderbolt from his fingertips, hitting his target perfectly, only for the elemental to vanish in a swirl of mist the moment the attack contacted. It had been an illusion.

He saw Wyatt grin and open his mouth before he felt like his skull was imploding for a brief second, bursting in a spray of orbs that scattered into the sea breeze, only to reform almost instantaneously. "I can't believe you fell for it again!" Wyatt chuckled dryly, fading in a gout of mist that returned Mercury to her true form, towering over Leo as he recovered from the attack, "I wonder though… How much magic it takes from you every time you reform? Definitely too much for you to keep doing it again and again while also using up more magic by fighting. You're losing more magic than you're gaining, Elder. It's just a matter of time before I win outright!" She said, her sharp teeth on show due to the manic grin set on her face.

Leo chewed his bottom lip. She was right. It took a while to recharge his magic after each time he reformed. If he was forced to do it multiple times in a short space of time, he would eventually just blow up and move on to the afterlife. His eyes widened as Mercury lowered her jaw, another pulse of concentrated water pressure heading towards him. This time, he was able to orb out, landing on a rock far away from the blast just in time to see the rock he had been standing on crumble into tiny pieces of stone under the pressure. He had to avoid getting hit by that at all costs. There was only so much he could self-heal. He could already feel some of the cuts on his face from earlier in the fight no longer sealing themselves up again due to the magic shortage he was now experiencing.

After nearly a century of life, Leo had never felt more mortal.

* * *

Brennan slammed the heels of his hands against his temples once again as the Angel's Melody pulsed throughout Sanctuary. It was like someone drilling directly into his head. He watched the security camera as Jupiter floated calmly at the mouth of the passageway that led into the lab, singing and making the air of the tunnel pulse as she tried to destroy her impediment. Jesse had been able to set up multiple gates of lasers in the passageway to protect them, and now they were the only thing that stood between them and death.

"What the _hell_ is she doing?" Lexa shouted from next to the examination chair, glaring into the tunnel. Shalimar occupied the chair itself, blood pouring from her ears as she writhed and screamed, bucking wildly from the restraints she was in. They had retreated to the lab after not being able to mount a successful attack. Shalimar, affected by sound more than any of them, had taken to thrashing wildly and lashing out whenever Jupiter began to sing. She was in no condition to fight anymore.

"She's destroying the laser generators with the sound waves of her voice!" Jesse bellowed back, typing wildly as technical jargon filled up nearly all five screens that surrounded him, leaving only one monitor that was locked on any anomaly that entered the compound. The molecular was right. The first shield of lasers faded away as the generators embedded in the walls exploded, and the elemental hovered forward slightly. There was a moment of blissful silence as she moved, before the singing resumed to take out the next gate.

Lexa looked down mournfully at her feral friend as she once again began to thrash in agony. Her sympathetic expression soon turned to one to righteous anger and she stormed towards the door to the passageway, "Let's see her destroy _this_ laser generator!" She roared darkly, stomping out into the tunnel and facing down the elemental through the many gates made from red strings of light, wind blowing her back as she bared her teeth.

"Lexa, wait!" Brennan shouted after her, running into the passageway just as the mutant unleashed a massive blast of light from her hands. Deciding to join her, Brennan clenched his jaw, swirled his wrists and shot two powerful tesla coils from his fingertips. The two attacks seemed to hit a force field of sound inches from Jupiter's body. Her singing went up one key under the attack, before the symbols on the wheel she was bound to glowed and unleashed a godly fury of lightning on both mutants.

The tunnel lit up with so much static and light that the security camera was taken out, along with every single laser generator. Electricity coursed through Brennan and Lexa's bodies, their screams and Shalimar's screams melding into some kind of terrifying music that made every other sound fall on deaf ears. Brennan felt his body slam against the cold, marble floor, still tingling and twitching from the ferocious attack. "Lexa…" He groaned, forcing his eyes open to try and find his friend.

She was staring right at him, but there was nothing in her eyes. Smoke rose from her body, electricity burns covered her skin, and the only movement was when the residual voltage would cause her muscles to spasm involuntarily. "Lexa." Brennan repeated, Jupiter's singing now a muffled din as he stared at the shell that lay next to him. She had been standing a little further out than him, he was already used to having electricity in his body, and yet it seemed wrong that she was gone and he was still here. For some reason, it felt more like sacrifice than an accident.

"_No!_" Jesse climbed over him in a flash, his eyes already swimming as he dropped to his knees to check her. Brennan struggled to his feet, barely able to think straight with the singing coming closer as Jupiter floated toward them at a torturously slow pace, and the aftershock now wracking his body. "No, no, no, no, no, no… Lexa, wake up! _Wake up_!"

"Jess…" Brennan groaned weakly, putting a hand on his friend's shoulder and weakly trying to drag him back into the lab so they could step up the security measures, "We need… We need to we need to-," He couldn't think straight, he was slurring his words and repeating himself. His head felt like it was about to explode. While he had a partial immunity to electricity, it had still greatly affected him. "Get back in the lab!" He shouted, still pulling on his friend's shoulder before finally falling against the wall from his injuries.

Jesse had stopped the listening the moment Lexa hadn't responded to his pleas. His face crimson from rage, he looked up at the advancing elemental, glaring at the band of fabric that covered her eyes before leaping to his feet and running towards Jupiter, taking in a breath and massing out before the sound waves could throw him back. With a rock-solid fist, he punched the crystal-like base of Jupiter's body, causing part of it to come flying off and disintegrate. The singing went to an even higher key after this attack, and Brennan stumbled into the lab just as Jesse took a breath, allowing the mixture of sound waves and wind to rip him to shreds almost instantly and reduce him to nothing but red mist due to his proximity.

His sight was beginning to darken, and Brennan knew he only had a few moments of consciousness left. Holding back hot tears from obscuring his vision, the mutant typed as fast as he could before tearing the cover off a large red button on the panel and slamming his palm into it. Alarms sounded, and steel door after steel door descended from the passageway ceiling. The lights in the lab went off, the computers shut down, and Brennan fell to the floor. The last thing he saw was Lexa's corpse, her eyes still staring blankly into nothing as the last steel door came down between her and the lab, sealing him off completely.

* * *

The first thing Aidan felt as he came to was a searing pain around his eyes. He could still hear the battle going on around him in the form of shouting, screaming, crackling, splashes and of course, the odd bout of sick laughter as Venus continued to throw them around like rag dolls. He tried to get up, and heard the sound of shifting glass as he moved his head. It was then with horror that he realized that his glasses must have smashed in the last attack and cut into the skin around his eyes. He eventually open his eyes to find blood obscuring his blurry vision, the flash of lightning and the glow of fire being the only things he could see in his current state.

There was a large crash, followed by the grunts of three different people. Aidan could only assume that Venus had used another gravity field to repel his attackers. There was a moment of silence, before he saw a large black blur heading towards him through the veil of dark red that covered his eyesight. Knowing what this was, the water elemental raised one of his arms and wildly threw out large, sharp icicles at the advancing mass of darkness. More laughter, but this time it was booming, as if its owner was standing over him.

"Aidan, watch out!"

Knowing that Skye was still alive was his only comfort as he was suddenly swept up into the air by one of Venus' claws that slashed through his stomach in the process. There was a scream of protest and fear from Skye, and Aidan braced himself for the agonizing landing he was sure to endure once he hit one of the many plateaus in the cave.

"_No!_"

That had been all three of them. He knew what was happening now. Pulse racing, he only had a moment to ready himself before he hit the infamous dark water that filled the elemental chamber. It had just been dumb luck that they had all managed to land on the platforms before this. One of them would have taken the deathly plunge sooner or later. Part of him of was glad it was he, as he wouldn't wish this fate on anybody.

He could feel himself dropping, and he could feel himself getting colder, but oddly enough, he didn't feel wet. He could even still breathe. The pain around his eyes was getting gradually less, but he still couldn't anything. It was that, or there just wasn't anything to see. Not even the light from the battle being fought above reached him now. At least, he hoped that was the reason couldn't see anything. He would hate to die, knowing that his death caused his comrades to lose their will to fight and just give up.

The abyss was endless. He would fall forever.

**TO BE CONTINUED…**

* * *


	41. Set Us Free, Part II

**Set Us Free, Part II (The Dark Before Dawn)**

Phoebe had to halt immediately as Paige suddenly stopped walking in front of her and turned to their side, looking out of one of the tall, crystal clean windows that made up the side of the corridor they were walking through. She followed her baby sister's gaze, only seeing all the buildings that lay in utter ruin far below them. "What's the matter? Why did you stop?"

"What do you sense from down there?" She asked quietly, not taking her eyes off the destruction below.

The middle Charmed One briefly looked up from her younger sibling to see that Piper had noticed they had stopped, and was walking back to them, "Um… I dunno. I haven't really wanted to even think about it, let alone completely open myself up emotionally to it. I feel like my soul is dragging my corpse forward at the moment. I don't need anything that will dampen my spirits. But… If you're asking what I'm just picking up on faintly, then… despair. Total and utter despair. The kind that makes you want to end it all…"

Due to the light pouring through the windows, Phoebe hadn't noticed Paige's eyes flare up with a golden glow, "That mist is alive…" She said lowly, continuing to stare down at down at the ruins, "Or at least as alive as spirits can be."

"Come on, let's just keep…" Piper's speech faded into nothingness as she looked up on the window that they had been looking out of. She wasn't seeing a reflection of Paige looking downwards with her eyes lit up. She was seeing a reflection of Paige staring out and smirking at her form. Her eyes flickered upwards when she felt someone's gaze on her, only to find that her reflection was going the exact same as her little sister's, "You guys, I think we have a problem…"

Phoebe and Paige instantly looked down the hallway in both directions, assuming that their problem was coming from either of these sides, before jumping with fright when they saw what was within the glass, "Don't look so shocked, Phoebe." Her reflection said, "You know who I am."

"We need to get out of here now." Phoebe said quickly in retaliation, refusing to give her reflection eye contact as she gently pushed Paige in the direction of the exit.

"That's right, you get everyone to safety." The being in the glass retorted, "I mean, we can't exactly rely on Piper, the supposed leader of the family to make sure everyone's alright, can we?" This made Piper stop in her tracks towards the door, causing the two younger Charmed Ones to have their way blocked by accident. "Seriously, what she does she do to make sure this family isn't killed by your enemies? You've studied the art of spell writing to the point where you've got it down to a fine art, and Paige can brew the toughest potions without even breaking a sweat. But God forbid we should ever lose Piper, whose only talent is to make an explosion that I'm sure no potion or spell could _ever_ replicate."

"You're not going to take that, are you?" Piper's reflection growled, glaring at Phoebe, "Go on! Tell her how you think that no matter how much 'growing' she does, she'll always be the eternal screw up of the family. How you think even when she's found her apparent soul mate, she's still picked badly. A man who has a paternity test performed on his child with no evidence to back up his jealous suspicions when really, you think he's a terrible person for abandoning her in the first place. And speaking of abandoned…" She set her gaze on Paige, giving her a harsh sneer, "The bastard child of the family. Tell her she's living reminder of the collapse of your parents' love, and how you will always resent her for being a product of that collapse."

"Like that's a secret." Paige reflection snorted with her arms folded, staring at her caster, "Always considered nothing but a poor replacement in Piper's eyes. The looks that make you know she would trade your life for beloved Prue's in a heartbeat. And she's been a rotting corpse for eleven years! You know she's pathetic for never being able to let go. All of it is nothing but lies. Especially this whole 'walk in between us so we can keep you safe' crap. If they could chop off your hands and keep their healing power, they'd do that and throw you down into that decaying city below. Keep you safe… At least your powers are active and oh, I don't know, _useful_, in a fight unlike some people. She has the weakest powers, and yet she's still considered better than you. It's a joke." Paige's reflection landed on Phoebe, looking her up and down as if she was complete dirt.

"At least I didn't take back the guy who left me pregnant with twins." The Phoebe in the glass replied acidly, "Do you have any self-respect, or are you really just a desperate wh-?" She was cut off abruptly when Phoebe threw her fist into the glass, smashing it and sending glass reigning down to the ground. Piper and Paige's reflections instantly vanished also, leaving the Charmed Ones dumbstruck in the cold wind that now filled the corridor.

"You… you think that I'm useless?" Piper murmured, turning a tearful gaze to Phoebe who locked onto her eyes, "I support your freeloading, unemployed _ass_ for over three years and _I'm_ the useless one? It probably would have been more if you hadn't stumbled on a job!" She had raised her voice now, rage searing her throat as she glared at her younger sister.

"What's the matter? After all, that fits my role as the 'eternal screw up' who _always_ makes terrible choices and has a husband you hate. And yeah, you are useless. You have a nerve to call Paige a poor replacement when its you whose the crap substitute for Prue. You're a horrible leader for this family, Piper. You're always too busy being wrapped up in little custody battles over a child that isn't even yours or complaining about how much you want your _stupid_ normal life! And you!" She blazed at Paige, gritting her teeth in fury, "You think I'm weak? If I wanted, I could make sure you were terrified of me for the rest of your life with just one little ball of light. But I can see how that pales in comparison to being able to move stuff without _touching_ it!"

"Oh, like _that_ is the biggest issue here!" The witchlighter spat back with a sneer, "You think I was stupid to take back the love of my life when I had had his children, especially when he did find out that they were his children, he dropped everything to be a good father to them? At least my husband trusts me! You're hardly the one to give advice when it comes to functional marriages. I still can't believe you get paid for doing it!"

"Oh, so now you think I'm under qualified for my _job_?"

"God, the righteous indignation's a little much, Pheebs." Piper spat, "After all, that's pretty much what you're accusing _me_ of…"

"Be quiet, Piper!" Paige suddenly interjected as Phoebe went to reply, "I don't want to hear a word from your mouth! If it wasn't for me, you wouldn't have the lovely life you've grown accustomed to, and you yet you resent me for saving your ungrateful ass? I know for a _fact_ that if I wasn't for me coming into your lives, you and Leo would be divorced with no children; and you…" She spun on Phoebe, meeting furious eyes that matched her own, "Would be trapped in a hellish life with Cole that you never wanted."

"Don't you _dare_ talk to me like that!" Piper blasted back, seemingly on the verge of grabbing Paige by the throat, "Why should I even listen to you? You're nothing but a lost little girl who stumbled in and grabbed anything she could find. And if you want to play the alternate reality card, we can do that as well. Weren't you the person who told me you were dead in that reality? Yeah, and that's makes _me _the ungrateful one. Know that every breath you take is because of us. Prue was everything you're not. You're nothing. You just got lucky with your genes."

"Leave it to Piper to go and hide behind the memory of our infallible sister." Phoebe chipped with a disgusted smirk.

"Yeah, go ahead." Paige added, "Typical Piper, wilting at the slightest amount of confrontation by bringing more people into it."

"Oh, yeah?"

"Yeah!"

"Well, wilt at _this_!"

Paige, anticipating what was coming, vanished in a swirl of orbs as Piper raised her hands to attack. The explosion detonated against Phoebe's chest, throwing her back down the hall and sending her skidding along the floor, her jacket burnt and scorched. The youngest Charmed One orbed back in at the same spot, effortlessly sending Piper flying in the opposite direction with her telekinesis and giving her the same journey Phoebe had just taken a few seconds ago, only down the other direction. Paige barely had time to smirk at her quick thinking before she collapsed in pain from a psionic blast being sent into the back of her head as a revenge shot from Phoebe. The Charmed Ones all lay on the floor, each of them recoiling from the attacks they had endured. Brief looks of regret passed over their faces before they were replaced by expressions of sheer rage.

"I've had enough of this!" Piper was the first to get up to her feet, glaring heatedly at both of her sisters they too stood up. With a furious sigh, she turned on her heel and stormed off in the direction they had all been heading before their argument.

"Fine!" Phoebe shouted after her petulantly, spinning round and going back down the corridor, heading back to where they had come from, shaking her head and muttering as she walked away.

Piper looked over her shoulder and rolled her eyes when she saw Paige heading after her, "You had better not be following me!"

"Oh, please." Paige growled, speeding up her pace and taking over her oldest sister, not even bothering to give her eye contact. "First fork in the road and I'm out of here. This _bastard_ child can look after herself…"

* * *

Annabelle spun her scythe several times above her head before slamming the blade in between the rocky plates of Mars' back and into the soft magma underneath. A look of utter elation spread over the ex-mercenary's face when the elemental roared in pain. She knew her weapon would be alright. She had cast several charms on it for protection against heat and extreme cold. This was no different, "Pam, do some-!" A hoarse cough cut through her speech. Mars was only visible because of the fire shining from his body. Annabelle had no idea where Pam was. The smoke was like smog now, the attic was completely covered. Nothing was visible if you weren't within two feet of it .

Through the unbearable heat, Pamela ran to where she had heard Annabelle's voice, stopping herself before she collided with the currently paralyzed Mars, who was still roaring in pain from the scythe in his back. Praying that the spell she cast within the smoke worked, she took a deep breath, fully knowing most of what she inhaled was deadly, and threw her fist out to Mars' face, orange lines appearing like cracks over her hand. She had massed it out. "How do you like that? Son of a bitch!" Pamela roared, punching again and again to the point where the rock was starting to chip away.

Mars had had enough, with another terrifying roar; he breathed flames from his mouth and threw Pamela back into the main table of the attic, causing her to break the spirit board and the table itself with her body as she landed. If she hadn't breathed out a cloud of ice in the last second, she would have went up in flames now.

Turning, he caused Annabelle's scythe to snap, the tip forever lost in Mars' interior before he violently backhanded her across the room, making her sail through the air and straight into the dresser where they kept the potion ingredients. She fell to the ground in a rain of wood and glass, blood pouring from her head as she struggled to get up from the vicious attack. He had singed her face in the process, but the small sting in her cheek was nothing compared to the mind-blowing agony in her head.

The attic door exploded as the fire swept into the room like a pack of wild animals, thankful for some fresh territory to defile. Mars stomped towards Pamela as she got up from the wreckage of the spirit board and the table, glaring at her with curiosity, "Your powers aren't enough, your physical strength isn't enough, your fortress is being destroyed by my fire, and yet still you keep getting up to try again!" He bellowed, his black eyes wide in anger and confusion, "Why… Why do you continue to _fight_?"

Pamela growled as she stepped forward, shaking her head at the absurdity of the question, ignoring her bleeding nose as she grinned darkly. "You'll never understand why we keep fighting." She snarled, swinging her left arm out in an attempt to telekinetically throw Mars across the room as she advanced, only making him stumble slightly, "It's because…" Another swipe of the arm, another stumble, "We…" Swipe, stumble, "_Can!_"

"_Enough!_" Mars roared, throwing his boulder like fist into Pamela's abdomen and, with a nauseating tearing sound, ripped through her stomach to the point where she was almost impaled on his arm, blood completely covering his hand and wrist as it protruded out of the witch's back. Crimson liquid cascaded from her body on both sides, making a puddle on the floor. Her breathing hitched a few times as blood poured from her mouth, weakly trying to raise her head and face her killer.

"_Pam!_" Annabelle screamed, scrambling to her feet and stumbling towards Mars, her broken weapon in hand, but it wasn't necessary. The moment she raised her scythe to attack, Pamela's head suddenly flew back with a supernatural roar and before she knew it, Annabelle felt a sudden chill come over.

The blonde was thrown back when pulse of freezing energy tore through the attic, steam coming from Mars' body as it did so. Pamela's bloody mouth fell completely open, and what could be described as a raging, all consuming blizzard tore from her insides. Mars screamed at the onslaught of ice that was blasted in his face, as the ripples of frost that was taking over his feet. Pamela's skin had gone completely blue, and she began to glow as all the magic she had flooded from her person and into one of her powers. Steam continued to pour out of Mars until the magma in his body began to shine fiercer than it had during the entire battle. He roared, taking a similar position to Pamela with his head reared towards the ceiling, steam and smoke melding and only making the bright light visible to Annabelle now. He was about to explode.

All of a sudden, the blonde felt Pamela's presence around her, and the next thing she knew, she was on the sidewalk with all the residents of Prescott Street who had gathered behind the danger line firelighters had set up. The young witch was gone. She looked around, seeing two fire trucks outside the blackened inferno that had once been the Manor, continuing their futile campaign to stop the fire. It was then Annabelle realized that Pamela must have somehow been able to use her power of possession, take over her body, and get her to safety. She got ready to field questions from neighbours about why she looked like she had just escaped the fire herself, when everything finally fell apart.

There was a shockwave that sent a shiver through everyone present, before the top floor of Halliwell Manor exploded in a massive nova-like fireball that practically vapourized the whole roof, sending a spray of charred wood, and tiny remains of belongings that had been kept in the attic flying into the air and across the street. There was screaming, and everyone dove to the ground for cover as the resulting blast made the severely weakened foundations give way, making the rest of the house fall apart around its fiery insides with a deafening crash, leaving nothing but a gigantic plume of flames raging where the proud, crimson Manor had once stood. Wreckage that had been blown sky high was now coming down on the street like a rain of comets, causing the crowd to scatter and scream and flee while all the time, Annabelle stood stationary, staring at the horror that had destroyed so many lives within seconds.

* * *

Piper hissed in pain as her foot slipped from the rock she had been balancing on, causing her to slide back down the cliff face she was scaling, viciously scraping her face against the uneven surface before toppling to her knees on a small platform that jutted out of the main face, toppling to the dirty ground once more with an undignified thud. She fought the urge to just lie there and pushed herself to her knees, sighing heavily as she wiped away the mixture of dirt, blood, and tears from her cheeks with her sleeve. She felt like she had escaped from Hell and was having to scale its very walls in order to get away completely, but she was getting nowhere. The top of the cliff seemed unreachable, and what lay below was nothing but an all consuming green glow and that seemed to fill her with despair every time she looked down at it.

She wondered why she was continuing. With the fight she'd had with her sisters, her powers had vanished as a result of the Power of Three being broken. She couldn't make a stairway carve itself out of the cliff with her geokinetic powers; she couldn't freeze a piece of unsteady rock so she could use it as a step. She couldn't even blow anything up out of sheer frustration. She was nothing but a mortal slowly making her way to her doom.

The more Piper thought about it, the more the fight didn't make sense. It wasn't like the things that had set it off had come directly from their mouths, so there was no reason to trust it, and even though there were hints of truth to everything that had been said, it wasn't like them to just all start screaming at one another and say things they would immediately regret saying once they calmed down. Especially in a situation like this, when the Halliwell protocol was to save it for later, as when the universe is in danger is not the time to start attacking one another. And yet they had, without a second's thought, unleashed their powers on each other, said they hated each other, and separated. For all Piper knew, Phoebe had been slaughtered by a dragon from going back the way they had come, and she had no idea what had happened to Paige, who had gone in a different direction the moment the opportunity arose. She could be the only one left, stuck scaling this endless cliff with a body that felt like a cadaver and a spirit that was close to giving up.

It was if her salvation had come when a flash of white light deposited the Book of Shadows next to her, covered in ash and warm to the touch. Piper stared down at the tome, shocked by its sudden presence. As she thought as to why it had appeared to her, her heart sank even lower as she realized it had probably automatically transported itself to the main inhabitant of its sanctuary, as the sanctuary itself had been destroyed. The witch dragged her hands over the three separated points of the once brilliant silver triquetra in the centre, each of them now rusted, dull, and alone. "Phoebe… Paige…" She whispered hoarsely, her throat dry as she began to sob into her hand, the other curling into a fist, grabbing a handful of the thick dirt below.

Suddenly, Piper felt a soothing wind blow through her hair. It gave her life, hope, and a rush of excitement at the same time as the Book of Shadows opened and its pages flipped furiously on their own. Piper revelled in the breeze before it came to a stop, leaving the book open at a certain page. She peered over the passage it had been opened at, her eyes growing wider and wider as she read.

"Son of a _bitch_!"

* * *

Crash…

Brennan had no idea how long he had been unconscious, but he knew that he could hear the steel doors being broken down by Jupiter. Due to the widespread lockdown he had initiated, the lab was now lit by a single band of cold, blue light that can around the top of the walls. From his vantage point on the floor, the lighting made Shalimar look like a corpse as she lay out on the examination seat. It wouldn't have surprised Brennan if she really was just a corpse now. He suspected the feral must have had some kind of brain hemorrhage when Jupiter had went up another key to destroy Jesse, as the lockdown and disengaged her restraints, and she hadn't got up. Or moved.

Crash…

He couldn't hear the song anymore. The mutant had never been more grateful for so many layers of reinforced steel in his entire life, but it was also the same thing that was trapping him now. Part of him didn't mind though. After seeing how easily and ferociously the elemental had killed Jesse, he was grateful for whatever time he had left. He would try escaping with magic, but Brennan knew that Adam had designed the security system with witches and mutants in mind. He would be prepared for such escape attempts.

Crash…

Sanctuary was gone. The last image in his head before they had retreated to the lab was a jumble of wires, sparks, and ruin. Jesse and Lexa were dead, the latter's corpse on the other side of the final steel door. And for he knew, the rest of his family was dead. All that remained to be seen was whether or not Jupiter would get to him before the Hollow got to the world. It was terrifying to think of, but in a way, it also brought him some peace. He also didn't have a choice, as if he didn't think, he would be left with the distant echoes of lightning and singing coming from behind the steel doors.

Crash…

"Let…" Brennan gave a wheezy cough, trying to get to his feet. If he was going to be killed, then he was at least going to give his enemy something to remember him by. But first, it was about what he wanted to remember, "Let me see what is not there, my greatest desire now come to bear…" He looked around the dark facility, waiting for an illusion of Phoebe, or his children, or Jesse and Lexa, of all of them, but nothing came out of the darkness. The mutant's shoulders drooped. Had Adam protected Sanctuary from spells like that as well?

Crash!

A cold wind suddenly burst into the lab as the steel door tumbled to the floor with a bang. The singing was back in full force and Brennan screamed in pain as Jupiter floated over the threshold. A gust of wind suddenly threw him up against the wall. He tried valiantly to make a spark in his hands, but he just couldn't muster the concentration due to the Angel's Melody pummeling his mind.

The song went up a key, just like it did with Jesse, and slowly, Brennan felt his body being torn apart. Blood ran down from his arms and onto the wall he was practically crucified on. A large red stain began to grow on his t-shirt, saturating it in blood almost instantly. A sickening popping noise signaled parts of his skin bursting, the roars of agony from the mutant being drowned out by the haunting, deadly song that poured from Jupiter's lips. She went up one more key, ready to finally finish the target she had been sent after in the first place.

And then it all stopped. Silence reigned in Sanctuary once again and the chaos dissipated. A fist had flown through the elemental's throat from the back, killing her instantly and causing her body to explode in a plume of dust that was blown away by a gentle, spiritual breeze. Brennan dropped to the floor with an unceremonious thud. Silent, still. Just like everyone else that inhabited Sanctuary now.

It was then he saw her and closed his eyes with relief, "Phoebe…" He breathed hoarsely. She had finally stopped the music. She had avenged their friends' deaths, and it seemed; his too.

"Shh…" She cooed gently, kneeling down and cradling his head to gently stroke the side of his face, "It's okay, baby. I'm going to make all the pain go away…" As she promised, a psionic blast loomed above her eyes before shooting into his forehead, numbing him to the blinding pain of his fatal injuries. "Just let go, baby. It's alright, I'm right here. I'm not going anywhere…" The middle Charmed One whispered, tears in her eyes as she smiled down at her dying husband.

"Phoebe… I…"

"Don't strain yourself… I know you do. I feel it. I love you too…"

Phoebe? Why was he calling her Phoebe? Why was he talking to himself?

Her ears were still ringing, but that's definitely what she heard. Shalimar could only guess that he was hallucinating from the severe loss of blood he had suffered, and he was mistaking her presence for Phoebe. She didn't have the heart to tell him that it had been she who had dealt the killing blow to Jupiter, that Jesse had only just given her a sedative just before Lexa had died. That had been her last memory before seeping into her sleep, so she decided to stay silent and let Brennan see his wife in any way he could. That would be his last memory before seeping into his sleep. With salty tears rolling down her cheeks, she stayed with him until he no longer stared up at her with life in his eyes, before sobbing into his rapidly cooling chest, mourning for the three companions she had lost forever.

* * *

Leo tried to orb for the umpteenth time, only to find his efforts fruitless once again. He had been trapped in his column of water for far too long. Every time he "died", he would just reform in exactly the same place. It was a vicious cycle that didn't seem to be coming to an end anytime soon. He could see Mercury standing outside the deluge. She was a watery blur, just like everything else in his sight, but he knew she was smiling at finally being able to beat him. Orbs were starting to float away from his body, as if it was already starting to come apart from the multiple drownings. He could only reform so many more times, and he could hold his breath for a few seconds longer.

The water suddenly fell away and the elder dropped to the damp sand below, nearly being completely bowled over by the tide as it crashed against him. A choked wail of pain pierced the air. Leo looked up to see a familiar scythe embedded in Mercury's underbelly, blue liquid pouring from the wound as the creature held all eight of her tentacles to her head. An energy ball suddenly plowed into her face, causing her head to snap backwards and temporarily down her long enough for Leo to spot Annabelle standing on the beach, burnt and covered in soot and dirt.

"Pam's dead." She said emotionlessly, keeping a tight-lipped expression.

"What?" Leo asked, his voice going unnaturally high. This couldn't be. Pamela, his niece, the girl that he had shared a house with throughout her teens, the girl he'd helped to find her place in her newfound family, the girl he had helped with numerous history projects, the girl who had saved their asses time and time again. "She… She can't be." He murmured, ignoring the tears that were defiantly starting to roll down his cheeks.

"She was able to take down Mars with her… I'm sorry. She ended up protecting me, when it's meant to be the other way around. I'm older…" Annabelle growled, furious at herself for letting a girl in her early twenties sacrifice herself for the sake of others when it should have been her instead.

She was just in time to see Mercury rise up once again and began to wave her tentacles in a way that would summon another column of water. "Consider this my redemption." Annabelle said mournfully, before shoving Leo out of the way and letting the stormy column of water sweep her up into the air, her lungs being flooded as her burns were also brutally treated. Leo stared up at her in shock before noticing the elemental before him getting ready to trap him once again.

With an indignant roar, Leo raised his arms and unleashed as much lightning as he could muster, aiming for the scythe that was still stuck in Mercury's body. His target hit home, the weapon acting like a lightning rod that sent voltage pulsing through the sea serpent's body. An ungodly scream of pain screeched across the coast. The Elder let his gaze flicker to his side to see if the water had dissipated. He increased his power when it hadn't, seeing that Mercury knew this was the dead, and was bent on taking someone down with her. Eventually, her body began to smoke before it exploded in a surge of water that fell away onto the sand below, similar to Aidan's splashing power. Except she didn't reform, she didn't come back. She nothing but a part of the sea now.

The water instantly vanished, letting Annabelle crash to the ground, her skin pale and her body soaked to the bone. Leo, desperate not to lose anyone else, rushed towards her and turned her over, holding his hands over the ex-mercenary's chest and trying to ignore that her lips had gone blue. She had been in the vacuum a short time, but it had been deadly, "C'mon, damnit!" Leo shouted, combining his hands and pumping them up and down on her chest once he realized his powers weren't working, resorting to CPR despite knowing full well that there was only one reason why his healing power wouldn't work.

"Breathe… _breathe!_"

* * *

The Book of Shadows descended to the ground with a mighty thump as Piper laid it on the platform above her, before wrenching herself up to the top of the cliff. The appearance of their family tome had renewed her vigour and, with great difficulty, she had managed to scale the gargantuan impediment that stretched before her. She dug her nails into the thick dirt, grasping for anything as she tried to pull herself up, eventually succeeding by using the book as an anchor when putting it in a large indent in the ground. She didn't dare look down at what she had accomplished. This maze was constantly changing. For all she knew, the cliff had crumbled right behind her.

Darkness lay ahead. The rocky walls at her sides seemed to funnel into a smaller tunnel, the end to which Piper couldn't see. Gathering the book up underneath her arm, she took a deep breath and began to walk, her legs sore from her climb and only adding to feeling that her entire body was dead weight. The Book of Shadows became her only comfort and reassurance as the darkness grew. Before long, it felt like she was walking into oblivion. The eldest Halliwell witch didn't dare reach out to see if there were any walls, because there was no telling what lay in the shadows, just waiting for her to give them something to grab onto, so she clutched the book even tighter, holding it to her chest with both arms.

Light began to grow as she walked on. Or, at least, the closest thing to light she would get. Ripples and cracks in the rocky walls started to become visible, she could feel the crunch of brittle sand beneath her feet, and eventually, she could see that a whole cave had formed around her. Piper's heart sank, remembering the cliff that she'd scaled hours ago at seemed, and how a similar cave to this had come before it. But a far harder trial lay in the gathering light. Two familiar voices echoed against the walls, making Piper quicken her pace. Hope sprung to life in her heart once again, a smile growing on her face in relief at the fact that it seemed they had survived.

Her hope was swiftly replaced by confusion and fear at what she saw before her. Phoebe and Paige stood in the centre of the room, bathed in light from the thousands of orbs that swirled furiously around them. They were jerking in the same directions every now and again, hands at each others heads, and it took Piper getting a little closer to see that the two of them were at each others' throats. Paige had one hand at the base of Phoebe's neck, violently tugging at her hair as she tried to wrap her other hand around her older sister's neck. Phoebe, however, was making this less than easy for her. She had one hand across her youngest sibling's face, furiously trying to suffocate her by covering her mouth and nose it seemed, before Paige bit down hard on her hand, eliciting a scream of pain and causing both women to retreat slightly.

"Fourteen years of martial arts training and that's the best you've got? I thought you of all people would be prepared to fight without powers…" Paige sneered arrogantly, spitting out whatever flesh and blood she had taken from her sister in her attack and sending it to the ground. Now that Phoebe's hands were gone, Piper could see that Paige's nose was gushing with blood, and there were bruises at the side of her mouth and over her eye.

"No, actually… this is!" Spinning on her heel, Phoebe jumped into the air during her turn and managed to smack Paige twice in the face with a destructive roundhouse kick that required use of both her legs, making the witchlighter sniper to the floor with a groan of pain, "You want more, you runt?"

Paige's answer to this was to vanish in a swirl of orbs and reappear behind Phoebe, the latter being none the wiser before a sucker punch landed hard on the back of her head. The youngest Charmed One smirked at her downed sister, shaking the hand she had punched with in pain, "It seems the reasons I still have some powers is because I am a runt, so don't knock it, you negligible bitch!" With that, she threw her foot into Phoebe's stomach, inexplicably sending the witch flying through the air, some of the orbs surrounding them now following her as she crashed into the wall, slumping to the floor in pain.

Piper's jaw dropped open at this, narrowing her eyes when even more orbs appeared out of nowhere and began to rage a vicious tornado around Paige after her sudden burst of super-strength, nearly masking her completely from view. She began to make large strides towards Phoebe, who was only now beginning to recover, ignoring the glow in the corner of her eye that was coming from the Book of Shadows in her eldest sister's arms.

Piper looked down in shock as the top point of the triquetra was suddenly revived, shiny and silver once again before it moved down to where its end would make up one third of the ancient symbol. Realizing was this meant, she quickly raised her hand in Paige's direction, immediately sending the cloud of orbs scattering in a shower of sparks before Paige herself was thrown back onto the dusty floor, rolling several times before coming to a stop.

"Alright! That's _enough_ from both of you! You're gonna kill each other!" Piper blasted furiously, her eyes going between her sisters as they glared at her with a mixture of disbelief and anger at stopping their fight.

"Well, that _was_ the plan…" Paige growled, glaring as she pulled herself into a sitting position.

"Where the hell did that come from?" Phoebe inquired as she pushed herself up to her knees, nodding to the Book of Shadows.

"It came to me and threw a helluva lot of light on this whole mess." Piper shouted back, laying the book out on her arms before flipping through the pages furiously, trying to the find the passage she had been guided to on the cliff. Once she had found it, she began to read aloud, "Mirrors of Mistruth." She boomed, shooting eye daggers at both her siblings to make sure they stayed where they were, "Since ancient times, these charmed looking-glasses have been used to create and elevate in-fighting in tightly knit teams or groups, and ultimately cause them to split. They are able to find one spark of negativity within a person about their team mates and magnify it to a catastrophic degree. This spark is usually a previously resolved issue, the memory of which is still inside the subject and is brought back to life under the guise of being a deeply unresolved issue. It can also be twisted to sound worse than it really is to the point where the mirror will say an absolute lie, yet the subject will not deny what it said, as there is a sliver of truth in everything that is uttered." She slammed the book shut, raising an eyebrow, "Sound familiar?"

"No."

"Nope."

Piper shook her head, "Well, it should!" She threw the tome down between them, turning to her youngest sibling with sincerity in her eyes, "Paige, that mirror was right about one thing: I do compare you to Prue. I do it all the time, but believe me when I say that it is only in a good way. I see so much of her strength in you, I see her will to protect everything that's dear to her in you, I see her constant thirst for knowledge… I see so much of her within you, and yet that doesn't stop you from being entirely your person. A person who I have silly little arguments with, who loves to get under my skin, and who infuriates me like nothing on Earth, but it's you, and I have more love for you than you will never know." As the witchlighter's expression began to soften, Piper spun in the other direction, "Phoebe, I do not think you are a screw up. My only criticism, and constant worry, is that your heart can sometimes overpower your head in the most inconvenient of circumstances. But at the same time, I'm so jealous of that quality… I _wish_ I could have that much faith in the people around me and let people in easier, because I know it would mean that, for once, I wouldn't have to carry the world on my shoulders. You have the kind of emotional freedom that everyone wants, but I also know that wearing your heart on your sleeve like that leaves you even more vulnerable when you're hurt, and I don't have the courage to face the possibility of that much pain. And at times, I don't think you do either and your emotions just consume you." She paused, letting Phoebe take in this information, "And I do _not_ hate Brennan. He hurt you badly, and as your big sister, I will forever be watching him like a hawk so I can break his legs if he does it again, no matter how good a father I think he is, or how much I think he's making an excellent amends for the actions that he himself will never forget. But I can't turn off the big sister behaviour. Family is everything to me, and I'll protect you no matter what the situation. I'll protect _both_ of you!" She insisted, turning back and glancing at the Paige.

"I…" Phoebe whispered, her voice cracking slightly as she was still winded from the last hit Paige had struck her with, "I don't think you're a terrible leader." She admitted, "Yeah, you may not have an area of Wiccan expertise like us, but if you weren't here, this family would be nowhere near as close as it is right now. I love having you guys as such a massive part of my life, and it's gonna kill me when I move away, but I know that you'll keep us together. You've been at the very heart of this family ever since you were born. You keep us together. You make sure we're all together at holidays, birthdays, and even just the odd weekend to make sure we don't miss anything in each others' lives. It's that closeness that makes us so strong, magically and normally, and in a way, that makes you the strongest leader this family has ever had. And you…" She said, shifting her gaze and smirking at Paige, "It doesn't matter that you were in your twenties when you found us, you'll always be the baby of the family, and it's like Piper said, you can't turn off the big sister stuff. I hadn't seen first part of your relationship with Aidan like the others had. To me, he was nothing but the guy who got my little sister pregnant and bailed. But you were right back in that corridor, he proved himself as a father, and that he was the one for you, but just as Piper's keeping an eye on Brennan, I'm keeping an eye on Aidan. I know what its like to open up, only to get your heart stomped on, and I want to save you from pain that devastating in any way I can."

The book's cover began to glow again once more as the rusty triquetra point directed at Phoebe gave off a brilliant golden light before regaining its magnificent form and moving towards the centre, melding with the point that was already there and leaving only one on the outside.

"I don't think you're weak, Phoebe." Paige murmured quietly, pulling her legs up and hugging her knees, refusing to give either of her sisters' eye contact, "In fact, part of me actually envies you for your abilities. Sometimes, I just feel like things would be easier if I could see into people's souls the way you do. I wouldn't need to go through the tired motions… I'd know what people really thought of me." Her gaze briefly flickered to Piper before going back to the ground.

"It's not as fun as you think it is." Phoebe replied, "I'd give anything to have the illusions normal people have."

The witchlighter sighed angrily and rolled her eyes before smirking at her older sister, "What, you and Piper get to have monologues and I don't?"

"Sorry…"

"Knowledge is your power, Phoebe. I'd love to have that, because I see what kind of person you are and… Well, you've had growth that puts Piper and me to shame. And speaking of which…" She looked up, catching Piper's eyes, "The things my reflection said have nothing to do with how you deal with the fact that your big sister isn't in the world anymore. And yeah, I know she's my big sister too, but I don't know her, and sometimes I struggle with thought in the back of my head that's telling me I'm a constant reminder of what you lost. I lost a faceless sister, but you lost a friend, a confidante, the closest thing to a mother you had, _and_ a sister. It's so much to live up to sometimes, and even though I know most of these issues are long buried, I just can't let go. Hell, I think that shows. I've carried this around for eleven years, after all."

"Well, you can lose it right now." Piper ordered firmly, "You don't need to live up to anyone's expectations but your own. And you're right. When Prue died, we lost a lot, but we also gained so much from you coming to us, and you need to always remember that, and always know that we don't regret your existence for one second." Piper paused, pursing her lips in determination and as Phoebe nodded sagely in agreement, "You're a fantastic person, and I'm just grateful that we were allowed to see you grow over these past eleven years."

Paige smiled slightly, her body loosening as she let her legs spread out onto the floor. The final piece of the triquetra glowed before turning silver and moving into the centre, completing the symbol from all three points and restoring everything that the three of them shared.

"We rock as these impromptu counselling sessions." Phoebe said with a grin, earning a few small chuckles from her sisters.

"We really do…" Piper agreed, before her eyes came across a stray orb streaking through her line of vision before it vanished into the wall. "I think I know what happened." She said gravely, walking into the centre of the room and picking up the Book of Shadows as Phoebe and Paige joined her. "We learned that every orb is a spirit, right? Well, when I came in here, orbs were buzzing around you guys like crazy. I'm thinking that ever since we got in here, we've slowly been corrupted by the hate and anger of all the souls that the Hollow has absorbed. That's why we've felt terrible, that's why we all reacted so violently to the Mirror of Mistruth, and that's why you guys nearly killed each other."

"Oh yeah, sorry about that." Paige offered meekly.

"Me too." Phoebe returned with a smile, before narrowing her eyes in thought as she looked around the cave, sensing that the walls were rife with stagnant souls. "I think we may be able to use this to our advantage."

"How so?"

"Well, Adam and Eve told us that the demon Omega broke into the afterlife because he needed more power, as the magic in a human soul is limitless. So, why can't we do the same here?" She raised a questioning eyebrow, confusing her siblings even more, "Look, these spirits are furious at the Hollow. I can sense it. So, let's give them the means to get their revenge! Let's have them elevate our powers so we're even stronger, so we can take on anything that we come across as we go further in without even breaking a sweat. I'd sure like a power boost if we run into other dragon."

That seemed to be the swaying argument, "Do it." Piper responded quickly.

With that, Phoebe eyes closed over slowly as she exerted her will into the ether around her, rallying the angry spirits that she could sense around her. "Think of this as supernatural enlistment." She explained to Piper and Paige, who watched her summon their potential allies with silent interest, "Uncle Phoebe wants _you_!"

The walls buzzed with energy before glowing a ghostly blue, illuminating the entire cave instantly with a blinding light before thousands and thousands of orbs bled out through the rock. It was slow at first, but then, they shot forward towards the three witches, circling each of them and tightening the vortexes they had created around them before the Charmed Ones' themselves glowed. The orbs entered their body, latching onto their powers and elevating them higher than they had ever gone before. Suddenly, all the light vanished, leaving the three sisters standing in darkness, gasping for breath as they recovered from the sudden surge of power.

"How do we feel?" Phoebe asked uncertainly, her eyes wide with shock. Even she hadn't predicted the rush they would experience from absorbing the power of all the spirits.

"Awesome." Paige replied, "Better than I have since we came in here."

"Alright then…" Piper knelt down, carefully picking up the book from where she had dropped it by accident a few seconds ago, and shielding it in her arms, "Let's go and finish what we started."

* * *

Skye's hands shook as she weakly raised them towards Venus. Her face scrunched up in determination, a few purple sparks running up and down her arms before they drooped to her sides, partly out of fatigue, and partly out of utter despair for her situation. Grant had been forced back into the afterlife from the fighting; Aidan had been lost to the dark waters below, and Maxwell lay on a platform across the cave, not moving. Part of her wanted to just admit defeat, and burst into tears, because despite the fact that she was Venus' opposing element, he was just too strong for her.

She jumped to another plateau as the earth elemental's claw came down to hit her. It hit the ground with a crash, sending pieces of rock into the air it tore through the platform. The whole chamber was like this" scorched walls, smashed up platforms, and a lack of magic that had made it so grand in the first place. It was in total ruin. Skye shot a quick burst of lightning at the creature's impregnable armour and inhaled a deep breath before letting it out in the form of a gale to beat back her attacker. "You ready to give up yet?" She quipped sassily as he stumbled back to a safe distance. He didn't have to know that she was mostly asking herself that same question.

"I was ready to leave the moment the water elemental perished…" He replied, his voice echoing around her like a spirit in the wind, "If you other three hadn't been such nuisances, I wouldn't have stuck around to kill all of you, but as it happens." He raised one of his massive claws, a sphere of glowing orange light bursting to life on the tip, "You've all annoyed me with your constant will to fight, and now you must pay…" With a final dark chuckle, he threw the projectile towards Skye and waited for the scream of death to reach his ears.

But it never came, as the attack never landed. The energy ball had faded away into the ether just before it hit Skye, who had raised her arms as a feeble protection against the assault. Slowly lowering her makeshift shield, she looked around in puzzlement for her saviour as Venus did the same, equally confused as to why she hadn't been instantly killed. Something suddenly appeared out of the corner of her eye, and when she turned her face it, her heart began to race with hope once more.

Aidan stood on a faraway platform. Totally unharmed from what she could see; and his glasses looked like they had never even been smashed. His expression was deathly grim as he glared at the towering skeleton that stood far across from him. Something didn't feel right about this, Skye thought. The hope in her heart was replaced with a sense of foreboding and slight panic. For some reason, this didn't strike her as the same Aidan that she had known all her life. And yet, part of her knew that he was still in here, and that he was still going to keep her safe.

"You should have stayed dead…" Venus snarled, putting the two of his claws together in front of him and summoning a grand amount of energy and made the air ripple in its wake. A large ball of crushing, geokinetic power came to life before him, "Let's try this again!" He bellowed as he released his attack, following it up by a series of small energy balls to make sure that he pummeled his enemy into the ground. Skye could only watch the numerous explosions that piled up on the plateau, with deafening rumbles shaking the very chamber itself and threatening to bring it down on their heads. She had to eventually turn away from all the sudden bursts of fire. There were a lot of sudden cracking noises, before the entire platform fell away into the murky depths with a thundering crash, causing Skye to scream out. She couldn't lose him again, not after having being teased by his miraculous return.

A lone pillar of stone had prevailed against the attack as the smoke began to clear. Skye's eyes widened in shock when she saw something she hadn't suspected in her wildest dreams. Instead of seeing Aidan standing on the slim pillar, all she saw was a pair of pearly white, magnificent wings folded over one another, glowing beautifully in the chamber's dank, protecting whoever was behind them. Every large feather seemed to generate its on source of light, making the sight nearly blinding as they gracefully spread out to their span, driving away the rest of the smoke and filling the cave with so much light it was almost unbearable, reveal that they had sprouted from Aidan's back. One emblem was repeated all over the man's skin now. His body was infused with light, making it look the same colour as his wings, and his fierce emerald eyes shone out stronger than ever before. Skye narrowed her eyes against the gorgeous light and instantly recognized the symbol. It was so similar to the others, yet so different. It was ancient mark of the spirit elemental.

There was a sudden gust of ethereal wind and Skye covered her eyes as streams of powerful bright light tore from every single feather that made up Aidan's wings, shooting upwards and coalescing into one magnificent beam of energy before it flew towards Venus. She only heard the ancient elemental's scream for a moment before he completely vapourized by the divine assault, leaving nothing but a pile of sand next to where she lay on the ground.

"I'll use the power…" Aidan murmured softly, staring into nothing as his wings began to glow once again, "I'll bring life…"

Skye let out a yelp of fright as Maxwell suddenly shot up into a sitting position, gasping wildly for breath. The wind elemental had her hand clamped over her mouth in shock as he looked around wildly, his curly locks flying all over the place before his eyes landed on Aidan. Both of them remained on the ground, staring in awe at their friend as multiple beams of light suddenly shot from his wings and vanished into the ceiling high above their heads.

* * *

Darryl sighed heavily and rubbed his head as he walked down the steps that used to lead into the Halliwell Manor. The raging fire had finally been taken care of, and the forensics team was now combing the burnt out wreckage. The cop had decided to get away from the ruin when they had arrived, not wanting to know what they would underneath the hot destruction. He knew that this fire wasn't just a candle getting knocked over as Piper and her family left the house. The Halliwell's world was too cruel for anything innocent like that to happen. And despite his knowledge of how the sisters could easily escape a predicament like a house fire, an overwhelming feeling of dread had gripped him when he drove up the street, and hadn't left him since.

The scene was chaos. The police had arrived shortly after the finishing explosion to take statements and seal off the entire street, the fire trucks will still here as firefighters put out the remaining embers of the fire, and a few ambulances had also arrived to tend to people hurt by falling wreckage or who were just suffering from trauma. Darryl's vision was a sea of flashing red and blue lights as he made his way down the sidewalk, ducking under the police tape and heading towards his car. He had tried to call all three sisters to no avail, and was now dialing Pamela's number. She had to know what happened.

He nearly dropped his cellphone when he heard a distant ringing coming from behind him. It was slowed down and weak, as if the phone had sustained damage, but it was still hearable. Slowly turning around, he watched with silent horror as the forensics team dove all over the burnt out foundations, also hearing a phone ring within the wreckage and wildly searching for it. "Oh, God… No." Darryl murmured, snapping his cellphone shut and closing his eyes tightly to stop tears from falling. So tightly, in fact, that he didn't even notice the flash of light that shot down from the sky behind him, out of sight from everyone else due to their attention being elsewhere.

"Whoa…"

Darryl jumped and turned around, his eyes wide and his heart beating furiously as he laid eyes on Pamela Walker, a residual glow fading from her body as she looked around her location curiously, "Uh, okay, what happened? The last thing I remember is all this heat… then it felt like my skin was getting torn off." She raised her gaze to the sky, frowning, "Why is it night?" She cast her look down, staring at the street, "And _what_ am I doing on the side-?" She was cut off when strong arms suddenly constricted her body, her eyes bulging over the cop's shoulder as he squeezed her tightly, "Good to see you too, Darryl… Breathing start to become an issue here…"

He instantly let her go, looking at her confused face in amazement, "You're alive!" He panted.

"It would seem so… Although I don't know how." Pamela said quietly, staring down at her hands in bemusement, "Okay, could you please tell me what the fu…" She trailed off, her jaw slack as she caught a glimpse of the smoking mess the Manor had become, "Oh no! Did _I_ do that?" She asked her eyes before her expression turned grave, "Piper's gonna kill me…"

* * *

Shalimar inhaled deeply as she slowly lowered herself onto the examination chair. Her hands were over her face as she wept freely into her palms, afraid to look at the lack of life around her. She had moved Brennan and Lexa's body onto the two rest areas on the side of the lab, finding large sheets in one of the compartments in the wall and gently putting them over her dead friends. She had searched the entire cave for Jesse until on the way back to the lab; she had spotted the massive spray of blood on the wall of the corridor and had to stop herself from breaking into hysterics once again. She was the only Mutant X member left, and it was only because she had _slept_ through the fight that had taken all their lives.

The feral fell off the seat in fright and onto the floor when one of the bodies underneath the white sheets suddenly sat up, quickly followed by the second. The sheets fell from Brennan and Lexa's confused faces as they wrestled with their covers, eventually throwing them off and onto the floor to inspect themselves. Brennan's eyes bugged out when he saw the large blood stain on his t-shirt, but he felt no pain, "Are we…"

"Alive?" Lexa finished, their attention turning to Shalimar who was still dumbstruck on the floor.

"You're… You're alive!" She finally shrieked, getting up from the floor.

There was a flash of light outside in the passageway, and a few seconds later, Jesse stumbled into the lab, looking just as bewildered as the rest of them. "We're alive." He said softly, padding his hands down his body as if he couldn't believe he was all there and breathing. The molecular walked slowly towards the others, Brennan and Lexa slipping off the beds as Shalimar also approached.

A wide grin suddenly spread over Brennan's face as he burst into laughter, "We're alive!"

"_We're alive!_" Lexa echoed even louder, before all four of them descended into elated, hysterical laughter as they jumped up and down like children and hugged each other tightly in the dismal darkness. They didn't even notice the state of their surroundings. They were just happy to be once again.

* * *

It seemed like hours since the ocean had pulled Leo into a catatonic state, staring out at the advancing and receding waves as they continued their pattern forever. He wished he had the power to dispute the tides, as if he did, it would mean he would have enough power to right all the grave wrongs that had occurred on this day. People who were gone would be here, his loved ones would no longer have to fight, and he wouldn't feel dead inside. He wanted to scream, to shout, and roar at the tide for being inevitable. He wanted to orb somewhere, anywhere; that was away from here, away from his failure that lay in front of him in the form of a drenched, cold corpse. But he couldn't even do that anymore. His powers had faded the moment Mercury had. He was mortal now.

Silent tears fell from Leo's cheeks as he closed his eyes, "It wasn't meant to end this way…" Only he heard himself, as the roaring waves drowned out anything around them. Always constant, always powerful. Never to be tamed.

One particular wave came right up over Annabelle's body and lapped around Leo's legs in his kneeling position, no longer caring that his khakis were in ruin. He cared even less when, as the tide pulled back, coughing and spluttering reached his ears and he looked down in amazement to see Annabelle's eyes wide open, water spilling from her mouth as she continued to bring up the substance that had killed her.

"Wh… what?" Leo babbled, quickly helping the ex-mercenary into a sitting position so the water would come up easier, "How?" The deadly cold in his legs that he had ignored so far suddenly came flooding back, but he took his jacket off regardless and put it around Annabelle's shoulders as her skin regained a sliver of colour. "Are… are you alive? Are you okay?" He asked, getting to his feet and helping the blonde do so before they were struck by another wave.

"I think so…" Annabelle replied distantly, looking around the dark beach and frowning as she didn't see a sign of the elemental that had killed her; "Is it over?" She asked; a slight hint of disappointment in her voice.

"Yeah… It's over."

* * *

"Stop."

Piper and Paige each complied with their sister's request, turning around to face her only to find that she wasn't even looking in their direction. Phoebe was looking down at the floor, frowning furiously. The middle Charmed One looked back the way they had come, before spinning back round to the way there were going, keeping her eyes on the ground at all times. She knelt down, her frown increasing in intensity. "When did the rocky cave floor become neat, stone cobbles?"

All three witches were now staring at the floor, investigating her claim. She was right. Without them even realizing, the ground had slowly morphed from the dusty, uneven cave floor, to perfectly laid stone cobbles that had a tinge of blue to them. They couldn't see when the change had occurred, as it seemed they had walked too far on without noticing and that it had happened ages ago. Paige could only shake her head despairingly at this latest turn of events. "Nothing surprises me about this place any more…" She growled, looking around the darkness, "Can we just keep going? The power boost is making sure I don't feel like a zombie any more, but I'd still like to get out of here soon. And preferably alive."

Piper nodded her head, "Agreed. Its okay, Pheebs. Hopefully, it means nothing."

Phoebe wore a rueful expression as her sisters turned away from her and resumed their walk. Rising back to her full height, she hurried after them, not wanting to be left alone in this lethal labyrinth once again.

The trio put themselves on alert when light began to grow at the end of the tunnel. In any other circumstances, they would have run towards it, but they knew better in this, a place that was able to turn their own minds against them. They exchanged nervous looks as it seemed another room awaited them. Silently knowing that they had to stay together here, Piper stood in between both of her younger sisters, taking their hands like they were children and she had been charged to make sure they didn't get lost at the supermarket. Content that they were connected, they walked through the gateway, instantly casting their eyes around their new surroundings.

It was a large circular room, the walls and ceiling made from the same cobblestones that made up the floor beneath their feet. But this was the least important trait. At different points of the room, three massive statues stood like the corners of a triangle. The statue directly in front of them was of a woman, adorned in a graceful dress as her head bowed down to the baby suckling at her breast. A band of fabric acted as a blindfold, shielding her eyes from the child in her arms and any other who would look upon her. The next statue to the right was of another woman, except her clothing was drastically different. She was positioned as if she was sacrificing herself. Neck bared; arms wide and held back, and her chest thrown outwards. Two strips crossed over her chest, joining at her navel and connecting to a long, flowing skirt, filling her with an odd kind of subtlety and beauty. The final statue was another vast contrast. The only tell that it was a woman was the full lips, as a large cloak completely covered her body, draping over her eyes and leaving nothing but the lower section of her face visible. The only other parts of her body that were visible were her hands, which were wrapped around some kind of old wooden staff. Each statue was terrifying in some way, but the Charmed Ones found their presence slightly comforting at the same time, as if the fear they induced would protect those who stood within their triangle from enemies.

"What do you think these are?" Paige thought aloud, asking no one in particular.

"No idea…" Phoebe breathed back, staring up at the statue that seemed to be the youngest out of all three and surveying the scantily clad statue to the right with a certain knowing. "I don't think they're anything like what we've come across so far though. I don't think they would hurt us."

"Do their eyes needed to be covered?" Piper asked worriedly, her eyes darting from statue to statue, not liking to her turn her back on any of them for too long a period. "It's a little creepy." She was about to add more to her statement, before she noticed the triquetra on the front of the book glimmering in a strange light. "Uh… you guys?"

She didn't get the chance to say anything else. The silver triquetra suddenly exploded with light, causing Piper to drop the book in shock and yet the light only grew. The rumbling of rock moving against rock echoed through the hall, and the Charmed Ones watched in horror as the mouths of the statues slowly began to open. In unison, the Angel's Melody instantly began to boom loudly from their stone mouths like some kind of magnificent, horrifying rhapsody. The three witches at their centre suddenly screamed in pain, before their bodies went limp and each fell to the floor with a thud.

* * *

"…And then I just asked Darryl to drive me here instead of taking me to the police station. I wanted to make sure you guys were alright." Pamela explained as she stood in the hallway of her grandfather's apartment, retelling the events of the day to both Leo and Victor, who stood in awe at what they had heard. "I haven't heard anything from Brennan or Aidan, but I'm pretty sure Aidan's alive."

Leo glanced into the guest bedroom, where currently, seven children were sleeping soundly on makeshift beds made out of blow up mattresses that would normally be used to go camping with. He reached into the room and gently pulled the door over, blocking the conversation from those inside. "What makes you so sure Aidan is alive?" He asked, folding his arms and keeping a stony expression. He wanted to believe her, but after everything that had happened today, he truly didn't know who would still be in his life tomorrow morning.

"I don't know." She admitted, "I mean, I remember the whole dying thing, then there was this peaceful feeling…"

"The first stage of your soul moving on. I felt that before I was dragged back to become a whitelighter."

"…then all of a sudden, I felt him… there! I don't really know how else to explain it. I just felt him there, and before I knew it, I was standing in front of what remained of the Manor." At this, she pursed her lips and bowed her head slightly in a mournful manner, "Sorry about that, by the way."

"It doesn't matter." Leo replied calmly, shaking his head, "As long as everyone's safe. That's all that counts."

"Come on, sweetheart. I'll get you something to drink and then you get some shuteye. You look exhausted." Victor said, moving down past the two of them and heading towards the kitchen. He knew what Pamela was going to ask next; because it was the same thing he had asked Leo when he had showed up at his doorstep, looking worn out. And he didn't want to hear the answer again.

"Have you heard from…?"

"No…"

"Oh…" The witch sighed, looking to the floor dismally, "Alright, I'll go and see if I can summon Brennan and Aidan. I'll try and make the spell pretty general so I'll find them… you know, wherever they are now." With that final ominous note, she turned on her heel and walked slowly in the direction Victor had gone in a few moments ago. Leo assumed that even though she had somehow been brought back to life, her body was still recovering from the efforts required to defeat Mars and was therefore responsible for her behaviour.

"What the hell am I doing here?"

Leo didn't even want to turn around to find that his imagination was playing tricks on him. But after a few seconds, he plucked up the courage and slowly turned in the opposite direction, his heart beginning to beat a little faster than normal when he saw Piper standing a few feet away from him. She was dirty, her clothes were torn, and she looked extremely bewildered, but apart from that, she seemed to be perfectly fine.

"Piper… What are you doing here? Where are your sisters?" He asked breathlessly, not even sure if she take a chance to go closer to her, especially after how Mercury had used his wife's form against him once already today.

"Good question. No wonder _I_ asked it."

He moved towards her immediately.

* * *

Phoebe's body went rigid with fear as she went from the deathly quiet of the statue room to the booming music of the club that she had landed in. She raised her hand to her eyes to avoid being dazzled from the flashing strobe lights that made the many dancers look like ghosts, with their movements changing every time the lights went out. The whole scene made her uncomfortable, especially since all she could remember was a song being screamed into her mind before she had landed here. With some difficulty, she tried to weave through the crazed club patrons and head for the exit, feeling extremely out of place as she was dressed for anything but a night out.

She was nearly at the threshold of the club, when someone bumped into her hard, sending her to the floor with a bump. All eyes were instantly on her with looks of slight disdain, as they clearly thought she had had too much to drink and just couldn't handle her handle her alcohol. Phoebe was ready to get back up to her feet and make a very public scene with whoever had knocked her down, but instantly softened when she saw who it had been.

"Oh, my God. I am so sorry. Let me help you up."

His hair was little bushier and wilder than normal, and the hand he was offering her didn't have the permanent scar it had acquired having an athame stabbed right through it, but it was definitely him.

"It's okay…" Phoebe offered wearily, slowly taking Brennan's hand and letting him easily pull her to her feet. It was clear he didn't recognize her, as the moment he saw her face, he gave her a grin that she remembered all too well from the first few months they had met. When he would hold onto her hand a little longer than a friend would, when his cheeks would get flushed from nerves or embarrassment. It was the grin he used to make a girl completely smitten with him. He just didn't know that it had already worked on Phoebe for seven years.

"Lemme at least buy you a drink to apologize." He said, already leading her back to the bar before she had even agreed, "I really don't want to start the new millennium off with bad karma for knocking you down like that."

This made Phoebe stop in her tracks immediately, "New millennium?"

Brennan turned to her, giving her a quizzical expression before grinning broadly at her once again, "Where haven you been? We're half an hour away from the year 2000!"

* * *

Something didn't feel right.

The living room looked vaguely familiar, but the furniture had been drastically changed. All of the mismatched rugs that covered the wooden floors had been removed, leaving nothing but the dark oak floorboards that were gleaming unlike Paige had ever seen before. Dark grey, leather sofas filled up most of the space in the same positions that the previous sofas had had, and aside from the treated wood borders around the doorways, every wall was now a pearly white. The fireplace remained intact, only now in a slightly lighter tone as, Paige suspected, the original colour would have clashed too much with the light of the walls. And as she looked up as these perfect walls, Paige realized that the room wasn't even in the right shape. The only thing she could identify it with was the ever familiar view outside. Was this really the Manor?

Turning around, she was instantly confronted with a massively different sunroom behind her. It rose up a lot higher than the one she was used to, allowing so much more light to pour in and bathe the whole room in a celestial glow, hitting a glass wind chime that hung on one of the window latches and cast shafts of light that moved around the conservatory like the swirling spheres of light that were present whenever they cast a spell. She was thankful to see that the floor and the furniture seemed similar to what she was used to, but apart from that and view from the front window, Paige would have thought she was in a completely different house.

Bringing her eyes down from the glass ceiling above her, she momentarily froze when she saw a man sitting on one of the wicker sofas in the conservatory. His dark blonde hair was speckled with quite a few strands of white, he stared straight ahead, looking towards the stairwell through a pair of black glasses. His hands were clasped over a thin, white cane and his wrinkled forehead was furrowed in concentration. He suddenly turned to Paige, allowing her to see something familiar within this aged face.

"Paige? Are you the Paige from the past?" He asked, his head wobbling as he was clearly trying to make eye contact the best he could with where he could hear her. "It's okay; you don't have to be afraid. From what I got told, nearly all of the things you're seeing around you probably make no sense at all right now." He said, smiling warmly in her general direction. Pursing his lips, the man leaned forward slightly, a look of concern spreading over his face, "Do you even know who I am? Hell, are you even standing there? I could be talking to air right now for all I know."

"…Aidan?"

* * *

"Piper!" Victor breathed in a hushed tone, looking at his daughter with a mixture of relief and surprise as he moved towards her and wrapped his arms around her smaller frame, just glad to see that she was safe and sound. "Are you alright? Is it over? You're bleeding. Look at your hands! What were you doing, climbing up a mountain?" He said, once again making sure his voice remained quiet. Pamela hadn't even gotten round to casting a summoning spell. The moment she had lay down on the couch for just a second, she had fallen asleep, and he wanted her to get some rest.

"Yes, no, I know, I see them, and yes." Piper responded wearily, smiling up at her father. She turned towards Leo, offering him her hands with a pleading expression. "Can you heal me, please?" She asked, offering him a small smile before noticing the look of guilt on his face, "What is it? What's wrong?"

"Uh… Victor, I'm gonna go and take Piper to the bathroom so she can get cleaned up. Is that okay?"

Victor nodded slowly, "Sure."

Piper sat down on top of the toilet as Leo began to run the water in the sink, making sure it was the right temperature to do clean her hands properly with. Reaching into the medicine cabinet above the sink, he pulled out a roll of gauze that looked like they had barely been used. This was a massive contrast to their own house, which was always running low on first aid supplies. "I'm mortal now." Leo said quietly, not looking up from the steadily warming water, "I won against the creature that was sent after me, and the moment it was vanquished, my powers disappeared."

"Damn Elders…" Piper growled, shaking her head, "I thought your powers would be gone after we destroyed the Hollow, not just when you beat whatever was sent after you. What if we need healing after the fight? Who will do it then?" She sighed loudly, looking down at her bleeding hands, "I'm so glad we'll be done with them after this."

"You and me both. Come here…" Leo gripped her by the wrists and pulled her to her feet, slowly putting her hands under the stream of warm water coming from the tap. Piper didn't even flinch. She had got used to everything physical injuries entailed a long time ago. "It's weird to think that my life has ended and began at the same time. My magic's gone, but now I've finally got a countdown until the end. It makes things a little precious, you know?"

"Really? I would have thought that giving up immortality would have been a little harder to do… Ah…" She hissed as he had to intensify his cleaning slightly to get a stone out of one of her cuts. She was entranced by the morbid sight her own blood mixing with the water and swirling down the drain, finding it calming for some reason.

"Not really. After about a century, all immortal beings kinda lose their passion for life." He explained, going back to his gentle methods while Piper's hands continued to bleed. "Knowing that, short of a darklighter, you'll live to see the end of all things is a little depressing, because whether we like it or not, death gives every action meaning. I mean, what would be the point in living each day like it's your last when you know your last day will never come? It was different for me, because I had you and the kids, but now that I can die… I dunno, it feels like I'm breathing for the first time in years."

"It's not that fun, trust me." Piper said sourly, yet with a hint of amusement in her voice, "I'm sure you'll feel differently when you see yourself age properly, instead of just changing your glamour so you don't continue to look like a guy in his twenties. I'm just glad your current glamour seems to have stuck, because if you had reverted to that fresh faced handyman, I would have felt like I was robbing the cradle."

Leo chuckled as he reached for the towel hanging over the side of the bath, "Actually, this is me, age forty. No glamour." Letting his wife sit back down on the toilet seat, he knelt down in front of her and slowly began to dab her hands dry. "I haven't been a guy in his late twenties for seventy years, Piper. I got old a long time ago. My body has just taken a little time to catch up. I'm ready to finally go through the motions of aging. As long as you're by my side, that is." He said, beginning to wrap her hands in the gauze, careful not to press too hard on her wounds, and not to catch her thumbs by accident.

"Well, one hurdle at a time, mister. I've still got the small matter of the end of all things to worry about." She said with a wry smile, watching her husband mend her wounds, mesmerized by the hypnotic way he swirled the bandages around her torn hands. "But I'll do my best to come back… We'll do this together. All of that other crap will just fall away. Just us and our family." Piper grinned down at her fully tended to hands, holding them up in front of her face, "Look who had healing powers all along."

Leo beamed back at her, raising his hand to her face and softly caressing her cheek, cocking his head when she moved to his touch. "I think it's time you went back to your sisters now…"

Piper nodded firmly, "So do I… For some weird reason, I just feel the need to go back." She took the hand that was stroking her face and held it in both of hers, rubbing the worn skin with her thumbs. These hands had saved a centuries' worth of lives. It was time for them to rest. "I love you."

"I love you too."

And she was gone.

* * *

"Nope, haven't seen anyone like her either. Is she your sister as well?"

Phoebe nodded, bringing her hand back down from above her head as she just finished describing Paige to Brennan. They had retreated from the club, slowly walking down the street and enjoying the winter air, careful not to slip on the slush left from compressed snow. The moment Phoebe had shivered, Brennan had shed the long leather coat he was wearing and put it around her shoulders, apparently not caring that it was now trailing on the wet ground. She had suppressed a giggle when she had taken the time to realize what a fashion statement this jacket was, and how her husband in the present would be horrified by himself for dressing like this.

"Thanks anyway." Phoebe said sadly, "Look, you go back to the club. I'll find them by myself. It's okay." Apart from the fact that this Brennan was ten years younger than her and therefore making her feel slightly creeped out, she was afraid of changing the past. What if there had been some kind of pivotal moment in Brennan's life on New Year's Eve and she had derailed it without even realizing?

"No way." He replied immediately, "The streets are dangerous; you shouldn't be out here alone. Besides, it's just another party, and it's not like I believe the world is going to end in five minutes or anything. I'll help you look for your sisters. If I'm lucky, they'll look as half as good as you."

Twelve years ago, she would have found something like that extremely charming, but now she was shivering, and it had nothing to do with the cold. Nevertheless, she caught up to him, frowning deeply as she replayed what he had said in her head, "'just another party'? Those sound like the weary words of someone who's become a little desensitized by the whole scene. Am I right?" She knew she was right. At this moment, she probably knew this Brennan better than he knew himself.

"I guess… Did you ever feel like you were meant to do something bigger with your life?" He asked, turning to her with a curious frown, "I mean, I know that sounds really arrogant, but I just feel like I've still got a destiny to fulfill out there somewhere, and that all the stuff I'm doing right now just doesn't matter… That _I_ don't matter."

"It all matters." Phoebe answered immediately. "Everything you do, everything you say. It has a reaction, even if you can't see it instantly. That's what destiny's all about. It's what you make of it, not what it makes of you. And most of all, you matter. Don't ever think otherwise. You matter to your family, you matter to your friends, you matter to…" She trailed off, stopping herself from saying something she would regret.

"You wouldn't be saying that if you knew me…" He said with a rueful expression on his face, making Phoebe cast her memory back to what Brennan had told her about himself during this time. She then remembered that he had said he had made money by using his powers to rob people and ultimate break the law. This had been before Adam had managed to wipe his existence from the national database, and he was, in a way, a wanted criminal.

"I think I know you pretty well."

"Oh, yeah? How so?"

Phoebe ran her tongue along her front teeth before stepping forward with a nervous smile, "See, here's the thing: I'm Phoebe, your wife and the mother of your two children from twelve years into the future. You run a legitimate autoshop, you're a fantastic father, and a great husband. We're moving up to Wisconsin soon so we can raise our kids in a peaceful and loving environment, and, if I remember correctly, you will meet some of the best people on this planet in around two years time. They'll be your friends for life. I'll come along a little later. I know about your shady past, I know how you'd go from girl to girl every night, and you know what? I don't care. Because you ended up with me, and you _matter_ to me. And seeing you like this… well, it just makes me what to get back to the Brennan I know." She shrugged casually as she finished, "It's just a shame I can't let you remember any of what I just said."

With that, a white light began to hover in front of her forehead, and as Brennan's eyes widened in shock, the psionic blast flew into his mind, momentarily stunning him and wiping his memory of the last half hour he had spent with his future wife. Above them, fireworks began to light up the sky, signaling the end of a millennium and the beginning of a new one. "Happy New Year…" She said to him, just before she vanished, letting his leather jacket fall out of the air and onto the damp ground as Brennan recovered from her psychic shot.

* * *

"I don't understand…" Paige murmured breathlessly, lowering herself into the wicker sofa and next to the man that appeared to be her husband as he stared off into the distance. Her eyes darted all over him, looking for distinctive attributes that would confirm his identity. She saw their wedding ring on his hand, the mole underneath his right eye was there, and as she sat down, she saw the calming shade of green behind his glasses. It was him. "What is going on? And where are my sisters?"

"Um… If I remember correctly, Piper is in your time with Leo, and Phoebe is in the past with Brennan. Not my past though, because that's kinda your present, it's your past she's in. Although I guess it's all of our pasts… You get what I'm talking about. If you ask me, I think you got the crappy end of the bargain. I mean, those two get to have these encouraging experiences with the ones they love and you get to find out your husband's blind." He said guiltily, instantly making Paige feel terrible for not being able to mask her despair and utter shock better.

"What bargain? What am I even doing here?"

"I… don't know. They just told me to sit in here until you showed up. It has something to do with you digging deep within yourself to find the strength and go that extra mile I think. Apparently, I need to talk to you." Aidan replied, shrugging. "Although your guess is as good as mine. I have no idea what I'm supposed to tell you…"

Silence. A clock was ticking somewhere.

"Can you tell me anything about this time? Like, I dunno, what year I'm in, why the Manor is like this… Are our kids healthy?"

"Oh, yes. Sometimes too healthy. It wouldn't kill them to slow down and be bedridden for a few days."

Another wave of silence. More precious seconds fading away through the monotonous ticking.

"Could I…?" Aidan began, leaning his cane against the edge of the sofa and putting his hands on his lap. "I don't know if this would be too forward of me, but would it be okay if I felt your face?" At this, he turned his hands, showing her his open palms. "I just want to know what you look like in your time. After a while, even your mental pictures start to fade. Especially when you get older."

Paige bit down on her bottom lip, hoping that he wasn't able to somehow sense her apprehension. A gesture like that would make all of this seem to much more real, and she wasn't sure if she was ready to accept this world as reality. "Uh…" She sighed, looking down at her own hands and flinched slightly when a drop of blood fell from her still bleeding nose, unable to heal herself after Phoebe had attacked her. "Okay."

Shakily, Aidan raised his weathered hands up to Paige's face, with her gently taking hold of his wrists and guiding him in the right direction before his fingers landed on her cheeks. He softly padded her fingertips against her skin, running his fingers along the bump of her cheekbones, the outline of her eyes, as he uncertainly dragged his thumbs over her lips, his hands jerking slightly when he felt a tear drop from her eye and collide with his own skin. He moved into the centre of her face, reaching her nose and frowning, "You're hurt." He said, shaking his head sadly at the misshapen, bleeding nose he had discovered.

Before Paige even realized it, a brilliant white light illuminated her face, the source being Aidan's palms which glowed magnificently. It was so soothing, so warm, so… pure. She felt her pain and fatigue melt away, she felt the ever present dull pain in the centre of her face fade away, and she felt the blood staining her skin dry up and vanish. The witchlighter closed her own eyes, allowing herself to experience this amazing feeling on a deeper level until it came a sudden stop.

"Please, don't cry."

She opened her eyes to find Aidan's hands back on his lap, looking extremely guilty and miserable in her direction, as if he blamed himself for his own condition. "I know that you probably think what's happened to me is horrible, and it is, but it's such a small part of a big, happy picture. I wouldn't change a thing in my life. I've experienced so much joy, so much love… I've led a great life. We all have, and it's all because of what you're going to go back and hopefully do." He smiled slightly, "Oh, and you have a timeless face. You're beautiful no matter what year it is."

"But… you're blind. Surely, if I'm going back to my time, you want me to do something about that."

"Oh, you do." Aidan replied calmly, "You take me all over the world; you make sure we always have a night a week where we act like kids in our twenties, and make sure I never, ever, miss a beat with our kids. You make sure I see everything I can, that I live the best I can… trust me, I'm fine." Heaving a large sigh, he took hold of his cane again with one hand, and held out the other for her to take, waiting until she did so for her to speak again. "I think you should probably go back now. After all, you've still got one more loose end to tie up, don't you?"

"Yeah." Paige said with a smile, hesitation in her voice before she threw it into the wind. "I know that you probably can't answer this question, but… when it happens, or when you find out its going to happen… How do I help you deal with it?"

His answer was simple. "You're there for me."

Her hand was suddenly gone, and the clock continued to tick.

**TO BE CONTINUED…**

* * *


	42. Set Us Free, Part III

_Part Three of Three. Enjoy._

**Set Us Free, Part III (Until The End Of Time)**

The ancient dust on the floor began to sweep up into the air as a whooshing sound passed through the air. There was a bright blue flash, depositing each of the Charmed Ones in front of one of the three statues in the room, with them facing one another all with overwhelmed expressions on their faces. Finally, the trio began to walk back into the centre, where the Book of Shadows still lay on the ground, apparently unharmed by whatever had happened to them.

"Where were you?" Piper asked both of them, casting her look between her sisters.

"Past."

"Future."

"Present." She answered her own question. "What were we supposed to get from that whole experience?"

"_To regain your will for the battle."_

"_To remind you what you had to fight for."_

"_To make you realize there's an after if you make it so."_

The Charmed Ones and instantly spun around on the spot, convinced that they had just heard the voices in their heads come from the statues around them. Phoebe, tired of the numerous games and trials they had had to endure, stepped forward with an indignant look on her face.

"Who are you?"

"_The calm before the storm…"_

"_The calamity itself…"_

"…_And the soothing breeze once the tempest subsides."_

"_We are birth."_

"_We are life."_

"_We are death."_

"_Maiden…"_

"_Mother…" _

"_Crone…"_

"_United…"_

"_Family…"_

"_Power."_

"The Triple Goddess…" Phoebe breathed, swirling on the same spot as she examined all three statues, armed with this new knowledge. She stopped spinning, landing back to face her sisters' curious gazes. The middle Charmed One knew from her extensive research into their powers, from everything she had ever learned about where they came from. "The original Power of Three… The root of all witches."

Piper was next to question these beings, staring up into the air so she wasn't just addressing one statue. "Why the hell are you in the Hollow if you're so important to the world of magic? I thought you were off on some untouchable plane."

"_We are part of the cage that keeps the beast contained."_

"_We put our words into their mouths so they could spread the cage… enforce its bars."_

"_Then we sealed ourselves within our cage, to ensure perpetual entrapment."_

"_We've waited… thousands of years, we have waited."_

"_The magic grew stronger, finally becoming something that would have the strength to purify this world of its final Old Powers."_

"_Forever tied to the beast, we will fade with its dying breath, granting rest to those who spoke our words for all these years…"_

"But… if you die, don't you take the powers of every witch with you?" Paige inquired nervously, supremely unnerved by the three voices whispering their ancient words in her head, words that had not been uttered for thousands of years, and would probably never be uttered again.

"_The power lies in no being. It lives in the very way of this world. The power of the witch comes from the plentiful earth, its ways manipulated into extraordinary abilities that give birth and continue to grant magic. As long as there is the world, there will always be the witch."_

"_Birth, life, and death, with eternity at its epicenter. As long as the wayss of this world are honoured, magic shall live until the end of time, regardless of who remains within it."_

"_This, is the true meaning of the Power of Three…"_

The ground rumbled slightly, before a stream of light shot out from the ground in the middle of the sisters, making them step back, startled. It shot up to the ceiling as a pool of glorious white light began to grow on the ground within their triangle. It seemed to be a portal of some kind, yet the Book of Shadows sat unharmed and immovable within the middle, the centre of the silver triquetra being the source of the single beam of light.

"_Step forward, and begin the end."_

"_Bring forward an age where the world no longer trembles in the shadow of Ultimate Powers, or perish trying…"_

"_Destroy everything, and rebuild."_

"_Be…"_

"_As…"_

"_One."_

Almost enthralled by the spectacular sight of the portal, all three Charmed Ones slowly stepped into the pool of light in front of them, instantly dissolving into a spray of twinkling bright lights that swirled on the spot for a split second before shooting off upwards to find where the darkness would finally end.

* * *

It seemed like they were in some kind of in-between world, with the only anchor being the massive clod of ground that floated steadily within the complete and utter chaos. And yet, despite their lack of movement, it felt like they were moving through the ether at an incredible speed, with so much light and so many colours flying around them in the absence of tangible things. Golden pulses that would slowly darken as they spread, emerald rings of light that would pass by like lights in a train tunnel, and the ever-present blood red hue that was more terrifying than anything the Charmed Ones had ever faced. It made them think that the blood of people who had tried what they were doing before had been sprayed violently across the world, forever staining it. It was like they had walked through that portal, and where still traveling to the other side. This was the infinity between destinations, an endless abyss. Eternity. 

Their hair flapped wildly around them, caught up in the supernatural wind, and yet they couldn't even feel the breeze itself. They didn't dare look over the edge, knowing that they would just see more of this yawning chasm of light and blood beneath them, just as it was above and around them. This wasn't the attic, or even a mildly threatened Underworld cavern. In this case, it seemed, the location was as dangerous as the dweller. It was vicious, snarling, waiting for its prey.

"Not what you were expecting?"

The Charmed Ones looked towards the voice and were shocked to find Katrina and her two partners, Vondar and Insigil next to her on the other side of the floating plateau. Her expression was unlike anything they had been from her before. It was emotionless, grave, and somehow, threatening. The other two beings wore similar expressions, looking toward the three witches with a vaguely intimidating aura.

"What are you doing here?" Piper shouted over the screaming chaos.

"Hopefully, getting killed!" Katrina shouted back, "Diam and Tyola… Well, they weren't the first servants of the Hollow, and you know that. They were the refined versions. There were three before them, but foolishly, they were made with human emotions and most of all, a conscience. The moment they saw the destruction and misery their maker was bringing, they vanished into the heavens, were gifted with the binding spell from the Triple Goddess, and were able to seal away their creator with the great sacrifice of every grand magical being left in the world, leaving nothing… This is our story, how the Higher Beings were brought into the world and how we changed it. Now, it's time for another change to occur, but you guys have got to be the ones that do it."

"You tricked us…" Phoebe seethed, stepping forward with fury shining in her eyes, "You gave us the new Book of Shadows, you showed us those souls at Journey's End, and you made us fight, all so you could kill us in this _grand_ finale? Why not just kill us? You certainly have the power!"

"Are you kidding?" Vondar replied, an eyebrow arched, "We don't want you dead! We engineered your powers from way back in time, when Melinda Warren was nothing but a twinkle in Destiny's eye. We gave you the tools you needed to become stronger, to elevate your power even more. We even controlled what you experienced once you entered the Hollow. We made sure you…" He made eye contact with Paige, "…would get the dragon's blood you needed to refine the potion you used against Diam and Tyola, and give it enough power to destroy even us. We made sure you would get the idea to use the power of all the stagnant souls around you, reinforcing your Power of Three and taking it to the point where you stand a chance in a direct fight against us." Phoebe looked down, refusing to look at him as he spoke, "And of course, we carefully choreographed the breaking of the Power of Three, and the reunion, just to make sure your bond was as strong as it could be. Everything in the last fourteen years has been getting you ready for this moment. The escalating danger of the enemies you faced, the personal woes… All of it's made you stronger. You _can_ beat us; you just have to fight like hell!"

"Why do we need to beat you at all?" Paige spat back, "You're the good guys! You're on our side. Why can't you just get out of our way and let us vanquish the Hollow?"

"Because it doesn't work like that." Insigil answered mournfully, looking down at the ground that moved through the chaos like a ship through the sea. "You're in the heart of the Hollow. Here, it doesn't have any power as all of it is on the outside. You got this far, and I applaud you, but when intruders get to this point, it summons its servants and fights through them, regardless of whether or not the servants want to. You can't vanquish it until you vanquish us. After us, there are no more beings it can possess here. It will be naked, exposed, and_ weak_."

Katrina's expression suddenly fell to an even more miserable expression, "It's coming…" She breathed, fear in her eyes, but also a sense of relief for finally bringing this to an end. She regained her composure in the last second, her face becoming wrought with hope and determination. "Don't hold back… because we certainly won't be able to."

A sphere of swirling colours suddenly bled out from the wailing vortex around them, making the Charmed Ones duck down to a crouching position as it flew over their heads, heading towards the three Higher Beings. It pulled up, hovering high above Katrina's head. It was a mixture of pure black and brilliant gold, with the constant stream of blood red, making it look like the embodiment of death. There was a low groaning sound, before the sphere slowly split into three smaller forms, and floated down to the Higher Beings below, ignoring their screams of pain as it pierced their backs, taking control and turning their eyes black as a result.

There was no going back now.

A colossal blast of energy flew from Katrina's hands almost instantly, heading straight towards the three witches before it detonated halfway through its journey with merely a thought from Piper, sending a spray of purple sparks and smoke throughout the battlefield and throwing all six combatants back slightly from the resulting shockwave. The smoke, despite the harsh wind around them, refused to shift, leaving the Charmed Ones completely open to attack.

Vondar pounced upon Piper almost immediately, the colours and light all around them reflecting in the shiny beetle black of his eyes. He raised his fist before bringing it down at a phenomenal rate, allowing the witch below him barely enough time to phase out and allow the punch to go through her, wrecking a large chunk of the ground and sending pieces of rubble flying into the air. He raised his fist again, but this time, Piper was ready. With a flick of her wrist, Vondar's movements were reduced to a crawling pace, allowing her to mass out her right arm and swing it into his stomach, sending the Higher Being flying into the quickly dissipating smoke. She got up and run in the direction he had vanished in, only to nearly be hit by another blast of energy spiraling out from the smoke. Without even raising her hands, she blew up the charge and froze the resulting explosion almost simultaneously, leaving both her and combatant unharmed.

Phoebe artfully activated her levitation power as Insigil sent her spinning after negating one of her kicks. If she had been powerless, such a maneuver on his part would have sent her painfully to the ground, but right now, she was able to float beautifully through the air, resisting the urge to take complete flight thanks to the power boost she was experiencing. Still in mid-air, she was able to throw her feet into her enemy's chest repeatedly, sending him stumbling back as she danced on air, kicking him over and over again until he finally fell to the floor. Phoebe then began to charge a psionic blast, only to find herself telekinetically thrown into the air as a form of repellant. There were numerous flashes as Insigil sent up a multitude of energy blasts to try and hit while she was disorientated, but she once again was able to float masterfully, weaving in and out of the attacks' paths before one finally hit her. The middle Charmed One fell to the ground like an angel who had had its wings clipped, landing roughly as the possessed Higher Being walked towards her. She could only look up as he advanced, before all of a sudden, she shot a powerful beam of rosy white light from her forehead, the force of which enough to make her recoil slightly, and send her opponent flying off in the other direction.

Katrina screamed in agony as another energy blast plowed into her back, throwing her forward and even further towards Paige in the process. That was the second time Paige had orbed her attack behind her without even uttering a word, and it was starting to become a burden to attack in such a way. The witchlighter merely smirked, having not moved once from the initial attack and just controlling her battle from one spot. This lead wasn't to last long through. Before she could even react, Katrina had finally managed to successfully retaliate with a vicious telekinetic punch which rippled through the air, throwing the youngest Charmed One back onto the ground where she rolled from the velocity for several seconds. This was a fatal mistake, as Katrina took this one moment of startle to send a powerful energy blast straight for the spot of ground that Paige was lying on. There was a bright flash of purple, and Paige was sent flying into the air again, cuts all over her body from the flying rubble. She was able to orb out before she hit the ground, righting herself in the ether before orbing back in and throwing her enemy high into the air with just a thought, the pulse of telekinetic energy also sending a torrent of rubble flying upwards and hitting Katrina like she was caught in a meteor storm.

Piper stood, lightly moving her fingers as bright beams of orange light poured from her palms, manipulating the ground around her and causing sharp stalagmites to pierce out from the ground, creating a rocky cage around Vondar and trapping him in her geokinetic magic. This prison didn't last long, however, as the Higher Being's body began to glow fiercely, and with a primal roar, he reduced the points of stone around him into dust, allowing him to move forth towards his enemy… but she was gone. A massive explosion suddenly detonated within him, blowing him to smithereens and leaving the exposed Hollow floating in the air for a second, before Vondar reformed around it, scanning the area wildly. She had become invisible.

With unnatural calm during this calamity, he closed his eyes began to concentrate; extending his will out from his body and into every plane of existence around him. With unbelievable precision, he raised his hand in the direction of an apparently blank space, and shot a power blast of purple energy towards it. The eldest Charmed One reappeared almost immediately, taking in a breath and massing out just as the attack hit, causing it to ricochet off her hardened body and fly back at her nemesis. Vondar was ready, however. He quickly diverted the sphere of power back in the other direction, catching Piper in a weak moment and sending her flying across the arena, landing on the ground hard with her shoulder scorched and bleeding heavily.

The middle Charmed One's heart began to beat even faster as she watched two streams of light slowly flow from Insigil's hands, eventually becoming two long, thin swords that looked like they would even be deadly to stone. He ran at her at an incredible speed, leaving a trail of dust in his wake before jumping up and descending upon her with both weapons ready to run her through. Like a rocket, Phoebe flew off into the air, a resounding clang echoing through the realm as metal hit stone. Landing far away from her enemy, she scrunched up her eyes and focused all of her power into her telempathy. She heard another clang, and hopefully opened her eyes to see that her plan had only half worked. Insigil had only dropped one sword while his mind had been controlled, but right now, she would take what she could get. Tapping into Insigil's emotions, she ignored the regret buried deep in his heart and found the trigger for his telekinesis, gesturing to the fallen blade next to him and summoning it into her hands.

The next few minutes passed by as a series of sharp clashes between the two fighters, swords moving faster than they ever had before due to both of their wills to survive. They struck at one another, meeting in the middle with a dull clang before pushing each other back. Insigil used this time to unleash a powerful blast of energy, to which Phoebe was able to fly into the air and dodge once again, doing an acrobatic flip over her opponent and hurling the point of her blade into his back. Insigil screamed in pain, his black eyes wide as he threw his sword backwards, taking pleasure in the wail of agony that was elicited from Phoebe as the blade went straight through her thigh. They stood there, both impaled on each other's weapons, in a seemingly never-ending stalemate.

Katrina threw her hands together; blue light threatening to throw her hands apart before she did it herself, unleashing a powerful shockwave of blue light that struck Paige in the stomach, sending her flying off in the other direction. Too startled to orb out, the witchlighter fell to the ground with a sickening thud, shattering the bones in her arm to pieces and leaving her unable to properly push herself up to a standing position. Katrina advanced upon her, smirking when she fell unconscious and lay vulnerable on the ground. She wasn't expecting it when a massive telekinetic storm swept her up into the air, before slamming her down harshly on the ground. This pattern repeated itself, with the Higher Being raised and slammed back down in a seriously undignified manner until she saw the cause of her humiliation. Another Paige stood next to the passed out version, raising and lowering her head in time to Katrina's controlled movements with a wise smile on her face. As the Higher Being was thrown to the ground for the final time, the unconscious Paige rose to her feet and exchanged a sly smirk with the clone standing next to her before said clone vanished in a flare of ruby coloured light.

With a vicious swing of her arm, a surge of mental energy ripped up the ground before Paige's feet and once again threw Katrina upwards, allowing her to be battered by the rubble before she inexplicably leveled out during mid-flight, crushing any boulders that flew towards her with a casual flick of the wrist. Before Paige could respond, a small energy charge flew from her enemy's fingertips, plowing into the ground and sending up a chilling wind before detonating in a vicious fireball that consumed everything in its path and threw away anything that resisted.

Piper and Vondar, nearly all of their magical trickeries spent, had resorted to heavy hand-to-hand combat, with the eldest Charmed One breathing heavily, alternating between massing and phasing out to either avoid or bear punches, or to throw them out herself. Her head swung to the side as her attacker threw his fist into her massed out face like a rock. She retaliated just as ferociously, throwing her own hardened fist into his stomach, a hit that would have killed anyone but a Higher Being. It seemed that Vondar truly was the strongest Higher Being, as he just kept taking Piper's punches, self-healing almost immediately, and going completely on the offensive. It was like attacking a brick wall, and if she didn't figure out something that would give her the upper hand soon, she would perish.

Suddenly, an idea struck her, and she had to stop herself from getting carried away in case her excitement would cause her plan's failure. Taking a chance, she dropped her magical armour and threw her hands out, knowing that the explosion would be more powerful if she used the gesture and not just her thoughts. Like clockwork, Vondar was blasted apart, leaving a third of the Hollow floating in the place where he stood before he reformed, but Piper was ready. The moment he reformed, she raised her hands again, this time freezing him for a few seconds, but this was all the time she needed. With a deep breath, she phased out her fist and plunged it into Vondar's gut as he began to fight off the breeze. Knowing she had barely any time left, Piper took a breath again, massing out the fist that was immersed in her enemy's body and wrenched her hand up through his insides like a hot knife through butter, shattering bones, tearing organs, and sending blood flying everywhere. Black energy poured from the mortal injury like smoke as Vondar collapsed to the floor, the darkness in his eyes fading away as his death unlocked his true self once again.

"Strike me down…"

Complying with his final request, Piper reached into her jacket pocket and revealed the potion they had used to against Diam and Tyola, only now; it was infused with dragon blood. With a mournful sigh, she swung her arm back and threw the phial against his chest. He remained silent as an inferno blazed to life inside him, his expression peaceful before the multi-coloured fire consumed him completely, leaving nothing but the piece of the Hollow that had possessed him, which soon split into two and flew towards the remaining Higher Beings so they would fight even better.

Phoebe could only duck and weave wildly as Insigil slashed viciously at her, slowly pushing her back towards the edge of the platform as she continued to dodge his relentless attacks. It was only due to the all the spirits within her that she was able to remain out of the sword's path, with their power increasing her agility, and their advice whispering in her head in the form of her thoughts, but even they wouldn't be able to help her if she fell off the edge. While her leg injury had severely hobbled her, Insigil was barely affected by the sword that was still stuck in his back, with the tip poking out of his stomach. Could nothing stop him?

The middle Charmed One whimpered frightfully when she reached the edge of the platform, feeling part of her heel hanging over the edge. It was with one final ditch effort she shot a psionic beam from her forehead, causing Insigil to whip backwards and momentarily loosen his hold on his sword. This was the chance Phoebe had been waiting for. She grabbed his arm and threw her knee violently against his wrist, making his hand jerk open and the sword to drop into her awaiting palm. With a final ditch effort, she ran the sword through her enemy's heart; black smoke pouring from the wound as he slowly fell to his knees, blooding beginning to run over his lips as his eyes returned to normal.

"Extinguish me… Please."

Solemnly, Phoebe threw the potion at his knees, causing the vicious flames to lick around him before ultimately covering him head to toe, a happy grin on Insigil's face as he was slowly reduced to a pile of ash at the middle Charmed One's feet. Phoebe was temporarily entranced by the black sphere of energy hovering in the place Insigil had stood moments ago, before flying towards Katrina, its last remaining servant.

All three Charmed Ones surrounded her, well aware that she now contained the entire Hollow within her as they trapped in a triangle of their bodies. They stood, ready to unleash everything they had left, to pour every soul they had absorbed, including their own, into bringing her to her knees.

But the moment never came. Katrina spun wildly around, facing each witch as black smoke began to pour her body. She grimaced, before letting out a scream of agony. She seemed to be fighting the controlling force within her, her eyes flipping wildly from being normal to black over and over again as she spun on the spot, holding onto her head as she wailed in sheer pain before finally landing on the ground. Her body shaking and smoking, she wearily raised her head in Paige's direction, silently begging her to act before the Hollow took control of her once again.

"End it…Now!"

Paige did as she was told. Bliss spread across Katrina's entire form as the potion destroyed her, her body loosening as she finally let go of her eternal life, surrendering to the cleansing fires that burned all around her before causing her body to explode in a shower of orange, purple, red and blue sparks.

Piper and Phoebe ran around to their youngest sister as nothing else stood in front of them, apart from the swirling, pulsing oblivion that now lay exposed to whatever they had planned to defeat it. It was so small now, barely bigger now than their heads. This was their greatest enemy in its purest form, the enemy that had swallowed realities, destroyed species, and waged terror upon the magical world for thousands of years. This was all it came down to. A swirling abyss of nothing that hovered before them. And, with hands held, they would destroy it together.

"The Power of Three will set us free, the Power of Three will set us free, the Power of Three will set us free!"

The Hollow began to expand and contract with no control, a low rumble spreading through the chaos all around them. Sparks of golden lightning were flying from its darkness, tearing up the ground around it and slowly breaking up the platform that the Charmed Ones had waged their greatest battle upon. There was another rumble, but this time, it sound more like a slow groan of agony as it was beginning to tear apart under the power of the spell that was being chanted over and over again. The blood red light that had surrounded it started to dissipate like mist, fading away into nothing.

"The Power of Three will set us free, the Power of Three will set us free, the Power of Three will set us free!"

Another rumble. More of the plateau broke off and fell into oblivion; becoming dust as the strikes of lightning would hit it. The gold and red that surrounded the darkness of the Hollow began to fall away, dripping off its non-form and fading away on the quickly vanishing ground. There was a twinkle of white light within the centre of the darkness, steadily growing and beating back the endless shadows that had been cast over magic and the world for over three millennia. Shockwaves began to pulse from its core, causing even more of the platform to crumble into the vortex around them. Even more lightning was flying forth, making the Hollow more of a source of light than a source of darkness and nothing.

"The Power of Three will set us free, the Power of Three will set us free, the Power of Three will set us free!"

The light was getting stronger now, having nearly consumed the darkness of the creature. Another unnatural scream echoed through the endless realm around them. More lightning. More crumbling rock, to the point where the only piece of ground left was the small part the Charmed Ones were standing on, holding each others' hands and screaming their spell at the top of their voices, an odd aquamarine shield rising around them whenever a stray streak of lightning headed towards them, protecting them from harm and allowing them to finally finish this tyranny.

There was a screaming, but this time, it wasn't from the Hollow, it was from the light that was now pouring out from its insides, destroying it from the core and working outwards. The world around them began to crumble, the ever swirling vortex beginning to slow as it readied to fall away into its own infinity. There was nothing but light around them now. So much light that is was blinding. They felt the ground beneath their feet crumble, and they fell, still their hands held, and still the light grew stronger, obliterating the Hollow and removing it from existence. It was over now.

"_The Power of Three will set us free!_"

* * *

**ONE YEAR LATER**

Wyatt stared up at the sun through the canopy of leaves above him. This tree house had fast become his favourite spot in the new house. He did like his new room, but he felt like he had earned this fortress, along with his brother. Having been devastated at the total annihilation of their old home, their father had vowed to help them build a tree-house in the backyard once the new house was finished. They hadn't been allowed one before, as his mother had always insisted that having a structure at the top of a tree wasn't safe for her children, but that didn't seem to matter now.

Coming away from the small empty window, he went towards the door that led to the ladder and looked out at the back of the house. Wyatt didn't know if it was because he had never seen the area from this perspective before, but the new house seemed a lot bigger than the one that had stood before it. It had been painted the crimson colour that the old Manor had had, and had been constructed in a design that allowed it to still fit in with the other Victorian houses on the block, but the windows no longer had stained glass trims, and the corner had been turned into a turret-like structure which consisted of an extension to the kitchen on the ground floor, and Lorna's room on the second floor.

"Wyatt!" Two voices shouted in unison.

He looked down to the kitchen door, seeing his twin little cousins hailing him from the ground. Over the last year, the physical differences between Melinda and Emma had become far more pronounced. Emma's hair was beginning to curl, and Melinda had more of a rounder face than her counterpart, but even they looked the exact same, Wyatt knew he would always be able to tell them apart.

"Pam's back!" Melinda shouted excitedly, before rushing back into the Manor as Emma walked out into the garden, heading towards the main tree in the backyard as Wyatt slowly made his way down the steps. As his confidence had grown, he had taken to jumping past the last two rungs of the ladder, landing on the grass with a light thud.

"Wassa matter, Lorny?" Emma asked with a curious stare, looking down at the young redhead who had been sitting in the grass at the base of the tree all along, crayons strewed in a circular shape around her as a blank piece of paper sat on her lap. "You not wanna draw?"

"Nope." Lorna replied quietly, smiling down at the paper with silent joy, "No more to draw now…" She said, distantly, before leaping to her feet and running across the grass as fast as her little legs would carry her, shouting at the top of her voice, "Pam's back! Pam's back!"

"Pam!" Wyatt gasped as he entered the large kitchen, staring at his eldest cousin with shock, "Your hair!"

"What? Does short hair not suit me?"

Pamela's skin was probably the darkest it had ever been in her twenty three year existence, making her piercing blue eyes stand out from her face even more than usual. It looked like she hadn't spent a second out of the sun in the past year, so much so that Wyatt could see parts of the skin on her arms peeling, probably from being burnt in whatever country she had been in before finally returning home from her world tour. A small wooden amulet hung from her neck, a charm engraved in its surface, while her hair, now barely brushing her shoulders, was swept back into a small ponytail and away from her bronzed face. She was wearing a white halter, so the tan line left by her bag strap shone across her chest as the only strip of pale skin left. She looked so worldly compared to the last time he had seen her all those months ago.

"Yeah, I didn't really have access to the proper facilities when I was traveling through Africa a few months ago, and it was getting all tangled, and greasy and dirty, so I just took a knife out of my bag and cut most of it off. Sold the remains to a witch doctor, the reasons for him wanting it I really don't wanna know." She smirked at her oldest cousin, "And you are still _really_ short."

Grinning back at her, Wyatt ran up to her and threw his arms around her, contrary to her statement; he was now up to her shoulders. "It's good to have you back, Pam. You staying for a while?"

"Yeah. I'm sure there's room in this _humungous_ new house." She said, looking up to Leo who was preparing food at the counter with Aidan hurriedly rummaging through cupboards, apparently looking for more plates. "Okay, I left a big bag of presents at the bottom of the stairs. Yours is the telescope looking thing with the orange lens. It's an Indian aura glass. It shows peoples' auras if you look at them through it." He had already ran off out of the room before she had finished talking, leaving her to roll her eyes, "Your welcome!"

Brennan chuckled at the scene from his vantage point at the dining table, Faith sitting on his lap greedily sucking on her thumb as Pamela turned towards him. "It's good to see you." He said with a warm smile, letting his daughter off his lap so she could run after her other cousins and get her present. "You kinda took off without telling anyone but the kids."

"Yeah, we had us really worried. We thought we had lost you." Aidan added, laying down plates on the counter as they shakily lay on his forearm.

"I'm sorry, you guys. I just… I had to get away." She replied apologetically, her expression turning mournful as she looked down at the ground, "I didn't need to see the wreckage of the Manor… which, by the way, is now completely mind blowing!" Pamela exclaimed, spinning back on Leo with wide eyes, "How did you manage to afford to build this? It couldn't have all been home insurance. The amount of times we've all claimed on that and you still have enough to _rebuild_ an entire house? I don't think so."

"Well, some of it was home insurance…" Leo admitted, before becoming slightly uncomfortable, "The rest was… well, it was money from life insurance."

"Oh…" Pamela trailed off, quietly, before becoming cheery once again and turning to Aidan, "So, where the hell are the girls? I still haven't met my brand new little cousin!"

"I honestly don't know." The elemental said wearily, "But you'll be lucky if you even get to hold him. Paige is very clingy with him. I think it's because he got her eyes instead of the twins, who take nearly every one of their physical attributes from me. Oh, and his powers haven't surfaced yet, so that might have something to do with it as well."

"Did you guys decide on a name yet?" Brennan asked.

"Yeah, but Paige wants to keep it a secret until the Wiccaning this afternoon."

"The last I heard from Piper, all three of them had gone for a coffee to catch up with Phoebe while she's in town." Leo said, facing his eldest niece as his face slowly fell, moving more food onto the main island "But you know Piper. A new house is like a blank canvas, so now I think they're probably going to come home with a ton of new stuff, because we can't just have some space. It needs to be filled!"

"Wow… I'm glad my flight was delayed." The witch said ruefully, "By the way, I saw your carpentry ad on a bench at the airport. Very nice. You have a trustworthy face, so I'm sure the work will be pouring in the moment you get settled into things."

"Thanks." Leo answered, "I already have a few jobs lined up for next week, so I guess it's just a matter of time."

"Pam!"

Pamela jerked involuntarily at that familiar shriek, cringing as she slowly turned around to face Piper, who was standing in the doorway of the kitchen, holding a tiny statue of a gargoyle in her hands as she slowly advanced upon her niece, "You gave my nine year old son a mini-gargoyle that shouts _profanities_ whenever someone unwanted enters his room?" She asked lowly, frowning darkly at Pamela as she was now pressed against the wall.

"Chris likes his privacy! …It's from France. I call it Arc Junior!"

Piper's eyebrow arched at this. With a deep breath, she slowly put the gargoyle down on the counter. Everyone in the room didn't make a move, afraid that they would set off Piper like an unstable bomb. Suddenly, she threw her arms around Pamela's shoulders, hugging her tightly, "I've missed your absolutely insane antics so much!" She boomed, pulling back and smacking her lightly on the arm, "Where do you get off keeping in contact through _postcards_ when you can pop back and forth whenever you want?"

"Oh, Piper…" Phoebe sighed as she entered. The middle Charmed now walked with a permanent limp in her left leg, having sustained lasting damage in the final battle a year ago to her thigh which no amount of magical healing would ever mend. She immediately made her way to the kitchen table, wincing slightly as she sat down, receiving aid from Brennan who got up and gave her his seat. It wasn't good for her to be walking around for too long without any rest. "The girl just got off the plane. Can you give her a break?"

"Seconded!" Paige called out in agreement, slowly making her way to stand in the space Phoebe had occupied previously. The witchlighter was holding on tight to the small child currently in her arms, his eyes closed over in sleep and somehow soothing the entire room with his own serenity as he was brought forward into the kitchen. "I would like to have no blood shed before the Wiccaning. They may do that kind of thing in some other cultures, but not for my son." She looked up towards her husband, surveying him with hawkish eyes, "You didn't tell them his name yet, did you?"

"My lips are sealed."

* * *

The backyard of the Halliwell Manor had never seen so much activity. If they had been friends with any of their neighbours, they would have been offended at the fact that they hadn't been invited. As it was, they were more disgruntled at the fact that the family had moved back into the street, even after the explosion of their house had sent the residents of Prescott Street into a gossiping furor and they had began speculating whether or not the Halliwells had been killed in the blast, despite numerous sightings of Piper and Paige around town, and the children at school. Some things never changed. 

Piper, aware of her sudden notoriety in the street, had decided to cast a web of magic over the whole backyard, shielding them from sight and making them nothing but disembodied voices to anyone outside the bubble. It was a necessary precaution, as the kids had taken to playing many a game with their powers, and nearly every single guest was magical. Between Brennan's sisters, the elementals, Mutant X, and the Halliwells themselves, you couldn't turn in any direction without seeing some kind of magical display.

They were all aware of the visible grimace on Phoebe's face as she lowered herself into a garden chair, her hand pressed hard against her leg before her happiness returned, sipping on the cool cocktail that had been made up for her. Aidan had done his best to heal it, but even with his temporarily transcendent powers, he hadn't been able to completely mend his sister in law's leg. It was just a minor annoyance at this point, but none of them had any idea as to how it would progress.

"So, what's been going on while I was away?" Pamela asked, popping a grape into her mouth as she looked around her aunts' faces.

"Well, I actually spent most of my time relaxing." Piper said with a satisfied smirk, "Yeah, Thyme and P3 are still doing great, Leo's getting his business off the ground, and the kids are going back to their old schools in the Fall. Although, I have to admit, we were all kinda getting used to living in New York. Where did you find such a great place with all those marble floors and massive windows? And that piano! Lorna's now got a flare for it!"

"Oh, you know… just a friend. What about the rest of you?"

"Well, I haven't really been up to much." Paige said with a sigh, earning eye rolls from both of her sisters as she shrugged casually, "I've been too busy being pregnant and helping Aidan get a promotion. He's fire chief now."

"Oh, please." Piper groaned, "She's an accomplished artist."

"I am not!"

But her eldest sister had already began to recount the story that had been a massive source of embarrassment for her, "You know how I asked Paige to do some paintings for the restaurant when it first opened? Well, one afternoon, some guy comes up to me and tells me he'll give me two _thousand_ dollars to take the painting off the wall and put it in the back of the van he had just called for. Next thing you know, she's got her own exhibition! There was even a bidding war over one of her paintings that went up to over ten thousand dollars, but she still didn't sell."

"Seriously?"

"Art is more sentimental than material." The witchlighter replied sagely, "That piece was just very close to my heart…" It had only been through rigorous wearing down from Aidan that Paige had been persuaded to put up the painting she had done after her parents' funeral. And while she was ready to show it to the world, she would never be ready to part with it. "Besides, I'm hardly in the position to be in charge of a lot of money. I prefer being a little more grounded… Actually, now that I'm thinking of that night, that was the last time I saw you." She said to Phoebe, "Where have you been? You missed the birth of your nephew!"

"I know, sweetie, I'm sorry!" Phoebe said sadly, squeezing Paige's knee as sat on the arm of the deckchair, "But I was helping this kid going through a really tough time… We were in the middle of a breakthrough when I got Piper's message about you going into labour and I couldn't just leave the poor guy in the lurch."

"So you're actually finding the school therapist gig pretty rewarding now? You were a little unsure last time I checked." Piper said, sitting down in the deckchair across from her two sisters while Pamela stood behind her, all of them drinking the non-alcoholic cocktails that had been made up for the party. They hadn't seen Pamela's grimace when she realized she couldn't taste any alcohol.

"I was just in an adjustment period, I guess." Phoebe replied, "The Ask Phoebe thing was always very impersonal, but here, I can actually see people grow and help them make the right decisions that will shape their lives. I've actually been able to organize a few camping weekends for some of the more troubled kids so they can see what the world is all about. It's beautiful country up there, so we might as well use it. Which reminds me…" She said, looking in Pamela's direction, "Your friend, Jordann? Total Godsend on a farm. I offered her a job and she's living with us now. She brought your cat with her."

"Really?" She asked with a curios frown, remembering that whenever Jordann was in the same room as Nightshade, she would either ask for the cat to be removed, or she would fidget uncomfortably under the feline's stare until it got bored of her. "Good for her. I knew it was good to give her your number. She prefers the outdoors to the city any day." Pamela looked down, seeing Piper staring out towards the mass of people in the garden and quickly murmuring under her breath, "What are you doing?"

"Counting." She answered flatly, "I don't think we're going to fit everyone into the attic, especially with all the spirits. Maybe we should just have close family come in with everyone else watching through a ronyx crystal."

Phoebe exchanged a confused look with Pamela at this, "Uh… This house has an attic as well?"

"Oh, it has an attic alright."

* * *

Phoebe had to smirk as she looked around her. As she had steadily climbed the floors of the house, she had marveled at how much fresher and different it was from the hollowed out building site she had seen at the start of construction, with every single room, fixture, and detail had been modernized, save for a few mementos lost in the disaster that Piper had re-conjured, purely for sentimental value. She had not expected to see this, however. 

The attic was exactly the same as it had been before the explosion. Her bike, the object that had given her her premonition still hung on the slanted ceiling, kept purely as a reminder to how everything in the last fifteen years had started. The mismatched carpets that covered the wooden floor where exactly as normal, the cluttered cabinets and dressers looked to be the same ones that had been there her entire life, the stained glass windows were still plagued by immovable grime, and finally, the Book of Shadows stood proudly on its altar, caught in a stray ray of late afternoon sunlight and bathed in a celestial glow. Pamela, upon seeing this room, raised the fair argument of the house not showing any sign of this room outside, thus making the outside of the Manor not match with the inside. Piper had simply responded with, "Get over it."

Candles covered every available surface in the room, illuminating the attic with a warm hue as Piper slowly opened the Book of Shadows, reciting the spell to summon spirits from the afterlife. She had chanted it so many times in the past; every word just seemed to roll off her tongue now.

In a mass of swirling white lights, the two spectral forms of Prue Halliwell and Julie Mulwray appeared in the attic, a golden stream of light flowing upwards across their bodies, slowly turning them corporeal as they stepped out of the circle on candles on the floor.

"Well, it's about time!" Julie instantly snapped, storming across to her agape son and tapping him lightly on the shoulder, glowering at him. Connor could only suppress a giggle. His grandmother was even shorter than his mother, and his father towered over nearly everyone they met, casting a slightly intimidating aura to anyone who didn't know him well enough. And yet Brennan still looked petrified of the expression on the old spirit's face, "How the hell does it take you _two years_ to get my little granddaughter a Wiccaning? What's your excuse?"

"Mom… I…" Brennan stammered, looking helplessly to Phoebe for assistance, only for her to repress her laughter and turn away from his pleading stare, leaving Faith to stare over her shoulder at him and laugh merrily. "We were busy! You know, the girls' thirteen year trial distracted us, and then the Hollow, and then we moved away… It just kinda got forgotten about."

"Wrong answer!" She barked, "There's no excuse for not having a Wiccaning…" The old woman froze at her own words, reminding herself about the reason she had been summoned for and instantly turned to Piper, a sincere look of regret on her face, "Except for you and Lorna, dear. The whole situation was a little complicated. But!" She spun back on Brennan, "At least she's righting the situation now!"

"So are we!" Brennan squeaked back, again looking to his wife, "A little help, please?"

"Granny Mulwray is scary…" Chris murmured softly to Leo, partly curious and partly terrified by the formidable woman that had been summoned into his home. Leo could only snort with laughter and ruffle his son's hair, putting a protective arm over his smaller frame to reassure him.

"Okay, let's just summon our two families, shall we?" Prue offered hopefully, not wanting to offend Julie by outright ordering her to get back to the book and say the spell, but despite her death, the control freak within the true eldest Halliwell sister had never perished, even in the afterlife. "Unlike us, these guys have lives to get back to." She said with an air of sadness, beginning to turn the pages of the book to the spell that would summon everyone required.

"We call forth, from space and time, descends of the Halliwell and Mulwray lines, parents, children, siblings, friends, our families' spirits without end, to gather now in this sacred place, and help us bring these children to grace…"

With those words, it felt like the very sky fell through the attic. Shooting stars descended, leaving a trail of light behind them before landing on the floor, giving form to every family member that had ever lived and died in the two families. Their apparel ranged from the most ancient customs to the most modern, every person vividly unique in their own way. But there was one thing that they all shared: An everlasting love for the people who stood before them, hands clasped with their lovers and children in complete and utter euphoria.

Prue held out her hands towards her youngest and least well known (at least to her) sister, her arms open for her new nephew. "May I?"

Reluctantly letting go of her baby boy, Paige complied with her request and relinquished him into Prue's awaiting arms. Phoebe did the same with Faith and her mother-in-law, only she was far less tense about the whole situation.

"I don't get it…" Piper murmured in a panic, looking around the sea of transparent faces desperately. "She's not here. Leo, where is she?"

Penny smiled from her vantage point in the front row of the Halliwell spirits, holding her arms out as if she was presenting something. "I do believe that you're looking for her…" She said with a smile. Another comet of light fell through ceiling, sparking around on the floor before giving form to a beaming redhead, even more magnificent in death than she was in life.

Emma's appearance made every live being in the room buzz with happiness. Lorna, having not seen her mother in nearly a year and a half, started to move towards her, only to realize halfway through her journey that if she ran at Emma to hug her, the quick tumble to the floor as she fell through her would hurt more than anything on this earth.

"Are you okay with us doing this?" Piper asked uncertainly, eyes locking with the deceased psionic, "I mean, technically-,"

"Technically…" Patty jumped in quickly, putting her hands on Emma's shoulders as she stepped forward and grinning at the girl her daughters had considered as the fifth Halliwell sibling. "Technically, Emma's been a member of this family for a long time, and this should have been done the moment Lorna was born. It's like Mrs. Mulwray said, we're righting a wrong."

"Call me Julie, honey. We share two grandchildren after all."

"Alright!" Piper quickly cut through the conversing witches, shaking her head, "I actually wasn't asking a gaggle of ghosts, I was asking Emma."

Emma laughed at this, her bright auburn hair glimmering in the natural glow she had as a spirit, "It's okay, really." She replied. "I was blessed to meet you guys. If I hadn't, I wouldn't have made such great friends, I wouldn't have found love, I wouldn't have had my beautiful daughter, and…" The redhead looked into the comforting swarm of ghosts that floated happily behind her, "…I wouldn't have been accepted into such an incredible family. One that is going to go on and on until the end of the time. So, if you're asking if I want my daughter to be a part of that, then I can only watch on with joy."

At this, Lorna walked away from Piper, holding her hand until the last possible moment before going to stand in between Prue and Julie, who smiled down at her as she took their free hands.

"We still have one more child to bless…"

Pamela felt tiny as all eyes in the room suddenly fell upon her. She blinked a few times, scratching at her sunburn nervously as an entire room of calm, peaceful faces looked back at her. It was starting to feel a little disconcerting. "Me?" She asked, as if she didn't know the answer, "Oh, come on, I don't need a Wiccaning. I got this far on my own, didn't I?"

"Don't I know it." Prue replied guiltily, "You're getting one, whether you like it or not. So move it."

The witch could only roll her eyes as she stepped forward, taking her little cousin from her mother's arms and sighing. "What a time to play the mom card…"

Lowering Faith to the floor and letting her take Lorna's hand, Julie stepped forward with Prue and faced the two families that stood before them, eagerly waiting to welcome these witches into their arms. "We pledge to be with these children…" She turned back, seeing that Pamela was now holding Faith's free hand; all four of them united by love and blood. The old witch had to hold back her tears of joy as she spoke, "… These beautiful children, always."

"Free, but never separate." Prue continued.

"Apart, but never alone." Julie added.

"They are part of us, and because of that…"

"…we shall bless them in all the goodness that we are."

"Welcome to the families, Pamela Walker, Lorna Thoroughway, Faith Mulwray, and…"

Paige exchanged a look with Aidan, silently winning the war of who got to reveal the name of their son. "Daniel Parker-Matthews."

"…and Daniel Parker-Matthews." Prue grinned, before turning back to the spirits.

"Blessed be…" From the high priestesses.

"Blessed be…" From the spirits.

And, "Blessed be…" From those who would continue to live on.

* * *

"Prescott Street has not changed a bit." 

"It kinda has." Piper pointed out, "We now have an annual street party. Although they may have just been celebrating the fact that, for once, those noisy Halliwells weren't living here at the time." She said with a smirk as she stared out towards the sunny street, perching comfortably on the bench that sat next to the open front door. A large strip of decking had been added to the new house, giving Piper a patio of sorts, and a place to put even more flower pots. "Oh, by the way, before I forget, I need your help at Thyme tomorrow night."

Paige, seeing that this question was directed at her, stood up straight from her leaning position on the railing and frowned, "Why?"

"Well, I have people from the French tourist board coming, and if all goes well, they'll put a little blurb about Thyme in the travel brochures and send any tourists my way. And since you speak fluent French, I thought it would really impress them if I had someone there who would make it easier for tourists to come in to the restaurant. That and you can totally butter them up in their own language."

Phoebe interrupted at this, looking up at her baby sister, "Since when were you fluent in French?"

"You gotta do _something_ on maternity leave. Plus, I deal with a lot of French art dealers, so its courteous to able to speak their language well when they can speak yours." She replied, before turning back to Piper, "And okay. I think you should serve the…"

"I know, but I was going to go with the…"

"No way, not that. Although maybe…

"I'm not serving that. Oh! Perhaps we could…"

"Oh, good idea. I'm fine with that."

Phoebe had watched this bizarre exchange in amazement, befuddled as to how her sisters had even communicated anything with substance to one another. She came to the conclusion that it came down purely to reading their facial expressions, a connection which she herself had shared with Piper, but never with Paige. Now, it seemed, the two had gotten close enough in her absence to practically read each other's thoughts. She had expected to be jealous of this fact when she realized, but it only filled her with happiness to see them both get along so well and so closely. "That was adorable." She said with a snigger, earning embarrassed expressions from her siblings before she changed the subject. "So, can someone tell me what a tree-house is doing in Piper Halliwell's backyard? I thought there was a ban on them within your mighty kingdom."

"Well, when the tree survived the explosion without a leaf out of place while the rest of the yard was incinerated, I figured it was strong enough to take the weight of a few kids and some wood." Piper conceded happily, taking a sip of her coffee, "Besides, we had a few hundred dollars left of Prue's and Grams' life insurance from using it to help pay for the house, so I just made sure we got the best materials, and the best workman, a.k.a. my husband."

"I'm glad you dipped in to the money they left us." Phoebe said lovingly, turning around slightly to rub a hand over flawless crimson wall of the house behind her. "We couldn't have found a worthier cause. This place is breathtaking."

"And it shall be until the next earthquake, or explosion, or flood, etcetera…"

Silence between the three. Cars passed by, coffee was sipped, and the world kept spinning. Even after a year, this kind of peace was totally alien to them. They half expected a demon to shimmer in the other side of the patio and hurl a fireball at them, incinerating part of the brand new Manor as it missed. In fact, a part of them even willed it to happen, as after all these years; it had just become the norm. Sitting back, relaxing, and just watching life go by was not how the Halliwell family was used to living their lives. They would adjust though, and when they did, it would be glorious.

"Have you guys had any demon trouble?" Phoebe asked.

"Nope. Well, there was a scare with a Cyclops a few months back, but it turned out he just wanted our help in getting back to his home world." Paige replied. More silence. More rushing cars. More sips of coffee.

Piper felt she had to add to this, "We would have called you, but…"

"Yeah…" Phoebe trailed off, looking down at her coffee mug. Despite her happiness over the newfound closeness between her two siblings, she didn't want to lose the bond the _she_ had with them, and she felt like that was what was happening here. She didn't live here anymore. All she had were memories. "Hey, you guys, I was thinking… Maybe we should organize a weekly lunch or something. You know, just so we don't drift apart? I didn't realize it this year because I was busy getting settled in back East, but I really miss you guys being a part of my life, and I would like to see more of you."

"Sounds good." Piper responded with a smile, putting a hand over her sister's as Paige nodded also.

"I look forward to it."

More silence. More cars in the distance. More sips of coffee. The distant noise of the kids playing outback warmed the hearts of the three battle worn witches that now finally sat in peace. Now, they were the ones who got to watch the world go by.

"You know, I never thought we'd get the chance to do this." The eldest Charmed One confessed quietly, moving her thumbs around the rim of her coffee mug as she looked down into the murky substance her family seemed to thrive upon, "I mean, the dream was always to live out the rest of our days peacefully, but I really did think we would go down fighting in the end."

Phoebe raised a sardonic eyebrow at this, smirking into her coffee cup, "We nearly did."

"Yeah, and how we didn't is still a mystery."

"I think it'll always be a mystery." Paige said distantly, catching her siblings' attention with her rather out of character tone, "Where would be the fun in knowing what saved us? It could have been just a happy accident, or a purposeful event engineered by some god, or I could have orbed us out and I just don't remember due to the trauma. Or, you know, someone up there likes us."

Piper snorted at this claim, "I seriously doubt that." She grumbled, "Especially since I haven't seen an Elder once in this past year, apart from the one that came down to congratulate us right after the fight."

"I don't even remember that!"

"Yeah, you passed out a few times. It was a combination of how draining the vanquish had been, and that you were losing a lot of blood from your leg." Paige replied, remembering the moment vividly. It was so clear in her mind mainly because Aidan had appeared out of nowhere with massive wings on his back, and had healed all three of their wounds in one go, bathing them in a brilliant white light that had faded along with his wings. She was still thankful that Daniel hadn't been born with wings sticking out his back. "Still, you get what I mean, right? The day we know everything there is to know about magic, we may as well stop being witches."

"Well, in that case, I'm happy to leave some mysteries just the way they are." Piper resolved, pulling her legs up onto the bench and wrapping her hands even more around the mug. "So, to recap, we are going to be careful, we are going to be wise, and most of all, we are going to stick together."

The clinking of coffee mugs bashing against one another sealed their pact.

* * *

_Pamela always kept her distance when she visited, for she didn't like to get too close to him when he was in some kind of therapy, as every time, he would make some kind of progress and smile such a smile that would make her want to run back into his arms, and that wasn't what they both needed. She hadn't told anyone about the sorry state he had been in when she visited him in London all those years ago. Her world tour had originally had London as its only destination, but as Keith's problem became clearer and clearer, Pamela had resolved that she just had to get away. But the witch would never escape him. He would always come and turn her world upside down, just like he had done now._

_She didn't know how doing yoga outside in the bitter November chill helped drug addicts overcome their problems, but she had picked this place for him on its reputation and services, and certainly not for value for money, so she would trust their methods. Pamela hoped with all her heart it would be worth it though. Keith was a good person, he had just fallen down a horrible path. Hopefully, the news she was about to grant him would help him steer clear of it for life._

_The session disbanded, and he saw her, and he grinned. Trying to hide her blushing face beneath her scarf, she wearily raised a hand to wave at him before she sat down at one of the many benches that littered the courtyard of the compound. As Keith neared, she was pleased to see that he looked so much better than when he had been committed. His eyes were no longer constantly red, he wasn't always sweating, and most of all, he looked so much more alive than he had been before being committed._

"_Hey!" He greeted her warmly, looking a lot happier also. This made Pamela feel better, mainly because this place had made him feel better, and everything she had done was worth it. "I wasn't expecting you until later. I didn't want you to see that I have a natural talent for yoga."_

"_It's fine." She replied quietly, smiling tightly over the edge of her scarf. He was shivering, but it was just because of the cold, for the first time in ages, and not some drug-related symptom, "Okay… here's the thing: I kinda need to tell you something, because I basically can't hide it for much longer, but I do not want you to completely fall off the rails and have some kind of massive breakdown, alright?"_

_He blinked at her a few times, "Okay, so far I'm not liking the sound of-,"_

"_I'm pregnant"_

* * *

"_Mr. and Mrs. Wyatt, thank you for coming in."_

_Piper decided now was not the time to get fussy over titles. She was already anxious enough as it was. Mrs. Redman, who was sitting on the other side of the desk, had become somewhat of a family friend after teaching both Wyatt and Chris as they had passed through the fourth grade, but right now, all Piper wanted to do was shake the poor woman for making her worry so much. Why couldn't she have just told them this news over the phone? Her first thought had been that Lorna was seriously hurt, but thankfully, she saw her surrogate daughter sitting peacefully at her desk at the front of the class, writing in her notebook. So what was the big emergency?_

"_No problem." Leo had replied to her, ever courteous. "Although I have to admit, you've got us a little worried." He said, smiling at the teacher while Piper just sat biting her nails._

_She eased considerably at the next words out of Mrs. Redman's mouth, "Oh, it's nothing to worry about at all. In fact, you should be very proud." Reaching into a drawer in her desk, the teacher pulled out several brochures and began looking through them, talking as she did so, "Mr. and Mrs. Wyatt, I have taught both of your boys, each of them intelligent in their own ways, but I have to tell you: Lorna is, quite possibly, the most intelligent ten year old I have ever taught in my thirty years of experience."_

"_Oh…" Piper breathed, both bowled over and flattered at the same time, "Thank you, although I don't see how this could wait until parent-teacher night."_

_Mrs. Redman clasped her hands over her desk, staring at Piper over her thin spectacles, "Mrs. Wyatt, I love to teach, and your daughter has been one of the most rewarding students I have ever had, and while it would pain me to lose her…" She pushed forward several brochures, "I honestly think that she would be better off in a place more suited to her intelligence. Now, if you can't afford one of these schools, then believe me, I will fight tooth and nail for Lorna to skip grades, but I'll be frank with both of you. This school is beneath her. It's my opinion that your little girl is nothing short of a genius!"_

* * *

_Phoebe sighed as she surveyed her son over her black-rimmed glasses, putting her notebook down on her receptionist's desk before walking towards him. Brennan stood behind Connor, his hands on his firstborn's shoulders, looking down with a mixture of pride and disappointment as his wife neared. The twelve year old's face had a large pink scrape on one side, with the origins of a bruise forming on the other. His dark shaggy hair was tussled, his lip was cut, and overall, the child looked even more savage than usual. The storm raging in his eyes did nothing to quell this appearance._

"_What happened?" She asked with a tired sigh._

"_He was fighting with a boy in his class." Brennan replied, "He broke the kid's arm, and knocked a few of his teeth out." Despite being cross at Connor for reacting in such a violent way, Brennan found himself mentally beaming at the fact that his son had been the clear winner in the fight. _

_Phoebe sighed for the third time when she saw her son's knuckles, torn to shreds from a clear collision with teeth. "Connor, your Dad and I teach you and your sister self-defense so you can do exactly that: defend yourself! Not use it against your classmates!"_

"_But I was defending myself." The adolescent insisted. "He threw the first punch and I went to the floor." He said, moving his face in different directions to indicate the bruise of his left was from the punch, and the scrape on the right was from the fall. At this, Connor looked up towards Brennan and glared, "It was a total sucker punch, Dad. He never would have got that close if I had been facing him."_

"_Why did he hit you in the first place? Who was this kid?"_

"_Tyler Messing." Connor answered acidly, "His parents split up recently, so I was gonna let it slide, but then…" It was his turn to sigh, deciding whether or not to tell her something, "But then he called you a bitch, and said it was your fault his parents were getting a divorce, and that's when the gloves came off."_

"_Evidently." Phoebe said sourly, looking at her son's battered hands again. She couldn't help but feel a rush of blinding love for her son for defending her though. "I guess this is what I get for being the only shrink in town… He shouldn't have hit you, but you shouldn't have hit back either. And just so you know, the Messings had a very peaceful separation, and they're still on good terms with one another. I was just too late to help them. I am not, however, too late to help you. Come on, let's get you cleaned up. I'll tell you how to watch for enemies out of your peripherals so this doesn't happen again."_

* * *

"_What?"_

_Aidan had to contain the lump in his throat as the Grimlock exhibited shock at what he had just said. "Did I stutter?" He growled, "The deal is simple. You give me my son back, and you can take my eyesight. You're the Grimlock leader. You can't be vanquished without the Power of Three, and they can't vanquish you without breaking the pact they made with the Source as you haven't physically harmed Daniel. C'mon, you have a lot more to gain by taking my eyesight rather than holding on to a kid whose powers haven't emerged."_

"_The sight of a spirit elemental, huh?" The demon replied, trying to hide his excitement. This kind of opportunity came along once in a lifetime! The power that must be in this being's sight, a being that could see into one's very soul! "Deal." He raised his hand to prepare to take Aidan's sight, only for Aidan to throw a powerful charge of white light from his palm and make the Grimlock stumble back._

"_I don't think so. First, I get my son back, then you get my eyesight."_

"…_Fine." He snarled in reply, swiping his hand across the air and causing Daniel to reappear in between the two of them. His eyes were magnified by his glasses, showing the harsh colour of red they had taken on from crying so much after his traumatic capture. He immediately ran towards his father, who wrapped him in a tight embrace, unaware that the Grimlock had already raised his hand once again._

_Trying to stay strong for Daniel, Aidan stayed as calm as possible when his vision was blurred by a slew of bright blue sparks, before complete darkness took over, even after he had opened his eyes. Not wanting to dwell here a moment longer, he transported them out of the cavern by slowly fading away into the ether and heading back to gave Paige the news that, unaware to him, she had been dreading for over ten years._

* * *

_Pamela hung the final photograph on the wall of the Manor stairwell. It had been at Andrea's first birthday at her birthday party in the park. They had been sitting under the trees, and Keith, being the professional he was, had captured the exact moment where the light through the leaves had hit herself, baby Andrea on her lap, and their eldest, Peyton, in the most beautiful way. Taking a step back, she looked around the entire wall, and the two walls that followed the staircase, all now covered in photographs of her family. She had been reluctant about moving into the Manor, and thus taking the mantel of family leader, but Piper had wanted an apartment with less empty space, and with both Wyatt and Chris off at college, she, Leo, and Lorna no longer felt comfortable in the Manor. It was time for new memories to be born within its walls._

_It was the perfect place to write the next installment in the series of books she had written about Sam Webster, a young boy who goes on a slew of magical adventures across the world. Pamela never meant the stories for publishing, since she took a lot of what happened from her own experiences. They were just to entertain Peyton as a child to prevent her from falling into the Harry Potter trap, and until she was ready for the His Dark Materials trilogy. As it was, Peyton was now halfway through The Subtle Knife, and since Andrea was still too young to appreciate her mother reading to her, she would get started on the fifth and final book._

_Managing to walk into the house without her mother even realizing she was there, Peyton dropped her book bag in the door and stared up at all the photos in wonder. Her vivid blue eyes jumped from picture to picture. Some being memories and some being of times she had never known. It didn't matter though, because combined, they had the same effect._

"_Now it feels like home."_

* * *

_Wyatt's knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel even tighter. He turned to his racing opponent next to him, sharing a cold stare, before revving his engine loudly. This, in turn, caused the other driver to do the same. Wyatt could only hope he was masking his terror. He had promised his family he was done with drag racing, but it was the only way he could make the money he needed to pay off debts to people who lived in shadows._

_The signal flared, and both of them flew off down the deserted road. Blood thrummed in Wyatt's ears, drowning out the sound of the loud engines as he pressed his foot down on the accelerator even more passionately. It was a serious shock when a swirl of white lights began to swarm around the passenger seat, quickly depositing a furious Pamela next to him. Her eyes were terrifying as she stared at him, shaking her head, "You complete and utter moron!"_

"_What the hell are you doing here?"_

"_You tell us you're done with this insane death game, and then you do this?"_

"_This has nothing to do with you, Pam!"_

"_It has everything to do with me!" She blasted back, "You are my cousin, making you my family, and therefore making everything you do something to do with me!"_

"_Get out of here! You're slowing me down."_

"_I damn well hope so!"_

"_Pam, I swear to God-."_

"_Look out!"_

_Wyatt had just enough time to see the safety railing his car crashed through before soaring high into the air and coming down on the steep hill with a thundering crash. Screeching sounded in the air as the metal was twisted and destroyed with the many revolutions the car was doing as it spun down the cliff. Glass flew everywhere, pieces of the car came clean off, and as it landed in a ditch with a horrifying noise, the vehicle's underbelly burst into vicious flames._

* * *

_Chris felt heavy. The only comfort to him was Bianca's reassuring hand on his arm as he gripped his knees until his knuckles went white. Two losses, striking him at the same time so it felt like one, one that made his whole world collapse. In one fell swoop, he had lost his cousin and brother, and become the oldest of his generation. A great burden now lay on his shoulders. Something that he had never been prepared for, and while he didn't yet know it, it would take months of painstaking effort to put his family back together after these horrific tragedies . Out of all them, Pamela and Wyatt had been the least expected losses that they would ever have to endure in life._

_He wasn't even listening to the Wiccan priestess' words as tears slowly began to trickle down his face. Nearly everyone else around him had dissolved into full scale weeping since the service was made up almost entirely of family. Peyton and Piper looked like both of their hearts had been ripped out. In a way, they had. The loss of a mother and son was something that no one should have to go through, especially when the victims were at such a young age. Keith had an arm around his eldest daughter, while Andrea sat in his lap, not able to comprehend the grief all around her. Peyton's gargoyle, Theo, stood like stone on top of one of the gravestones near by looking like an ornament to the mortal guestst, but really providing silent emotion support for his mistress. Chris had heard of the mutant's plan to move himself and his children up North and away from them. The twins had already resolved to fight him on this at every step, but deep down, they knew it was wrong to force the two young girls to stay in a world were even more grief was a certainty._

_There was a mass rumble around him as everyone stood up. Urged by his lover, Chris slowly got to his feet and went over to his bawling mother, and his father, who was ready to come apart at the seams from trying to hold it together. He embraced both of them, and went on to do the customary thing and accept peoples' condolences. This was a part of funerals that he had always hated. People queuing up to say "Sorry" seemed so informal, so emotionless, and completely pointless to have to stand here when all he wanted to do was orb himself to an empty strip of the Nevada desert and scream until his lungs burned, and the fury had been drained from his soul._

_He had noticed Persia on the periphery of the service, standing in the shade of a tree and crying freely. She too had lost a cousin, and shared the grief of her half-brother and sister. It didn't matter that she wasn't from this world. She had been with Pamela for most of her life, acting as her best friend with their bond built on the foundation of the fact that they were both accidents. Happy, happy, accidents. _

_His heart skipped a beat at what lay beyond her, for Pamela and Wyatt were staring at him over the otherworldly witch's shoulder, Pamela perched on top of a large gravestone and Wyatt leaning on it next to her. He had heard it was customary for witches' spirits to go to their own funerals, but he had never seen it in practice. Jumping off the giant slab of concrete, Pamela locked eyes with him and slowly nodded her head, before turning on her heel and walking away, briefly touching Wyatt's hand before she faded into the ether. His elder brother followed suit, raising a hand to his head to salute Chris with a smirk before vanishing forever._

* * *

"_You took your mom's cane?"_

_Faith turned towards the intruder with fiery eyes blazing, glancing at the walking stick that was resting against the edge of her bed before going back to trying to do her homework. She moved her index and middle finger up and down, making the pen between them bounce against the paper underneath. "She can't handle stairs without it, so I thought I would take it and save myself the trouble of getting yelled at again. But it seems she's sent her little protégé instead. What do you want, Lorna?"_

_Lorna gently sat down on the bed, surveying her little cousin over her thin glasses that were barely visible on her face from a distance. "I just want to talk. It's no secret that you haven't been acting yourself recently and you've kinda got everyone else worried about you."_

_The young witch shook her head with an angry growl, "This family is insane. You can't sneeze without everyone else knowing about it within a few hours. Daniel should get out before he's poisoned by all of it… I'd be fine if you all just left me alone!"_

"_We care about you!"_

"_You don't even like me!"_

"_Yeah, and the feeling's mutual, I'm sure." Lorna spat back. Faith always brought out the worst in her. The two had never got along, and neither of them weren't sure why, but it was too late to start all over again with a clean slate. Things had been said, feelings had been hurt, and irrevocable damage had been done. "Look, just because I don't get along with you, doesn't mean I stop caring. And between dealing with whatever you're dealing with, and having to keep up a constant mental block to make sure your mom doesn't find out… Well, you just be ready to keel over."_

"_How do you know about me using my powers to counteract hers? Even she hasn't realized."_

"_Because I sensed it the block, and went straight through it."_

_At this, Faith rose to her feet, apparently ready to let loose a barrage of screaming insults, before she faltered slightly and slowly went back to her chair due to the dizziness. "You know…?" She asked quietly, locking eyes with Lorna._

"_Yes."_

_The younger witch stood up again, slowly this time and walked over to the full size mirror that covered her closet door. With a sigh, she lifted up the layers of baggy clothing she had on and revealed the large bump in her stomach. Going purely on what Pamela had looked like when she was carrying Andrea, Lorna had to guess that her little cousin was at least six months along. Faith looked to the redhead, tears shining in her eyes as the barriers she had been making for the last six months faltered. "Please don't tell them…" She pleaded, her voice shaking._

"_Okay…"_

* * *

"_He's coming!"_

_Melinda rushed into the attic to find her two siblings, Faith, and Lara pouring over a map. She had heard that they were currently dealing with a demon, but it would have to wait. This was far more important. The elder twin was out of breath, her face was red and her hair was slightly askew instead of the long, thick blonde hair that was never out of place. "You guys must have gone after an innocent he wanted dead, because he's pissed and he's coming."_

"_Mom?" Lara looked up to Faith, fear in her eyes as she clutched to her mother. "What's going on?"_

"_It's okay, honey…" She breathed softly, stroking her daughter's hair as she stared an understanding glance with Melinda._

"_The Source?" Daniel half-growled, taking his glasses off. Now in his early twenties, he was the spitting image of how his father had been around that age, all except from the soft brown eyes that he had received from his mother. He easily towered over everyone in the room, and bar Connor, was the tallest person in the family._

"_Yeah. You need to get Faith and Lara outta here. Take them to Chris and Bianca's and tell Chris to get his butt over here." The lights within the room began to flicker and there was a breathy moan that passed through the darkness, sending a chill down all their spines. "Emma, go, now!" She screamed, seeing her sister reluctantly comply and take Faith and Lara to safety in a surge of water that quickly dried up into the floor. "Danny, get outta here!"_

"_No way." He said firmly, watching with horror as a column of fire burst into the life in the middle of the room and reached the ceiling, leaving the Source standing in its place with the points of his intimidating helmet scraping against the ceiling. Daniel was the first to react, with two beams of brilliant white light pouring from his hands and colliding with his enemy. The attack, which usually vanquished most demons, seemed to have absolutely no effect on the demon king, who effortlessly raised his arm and with a swish of his robe, the light had been neutralized and Daniel had been hurled across the room, crashing through a table and tumbling to its remains._

_The Source turned to Melinda and laughed at her glaring up at the oblivion in his helmet with sheer hatred. "Look at those lost little girl eyes. This family's always led by the eldest woman of each generation. However will you be able to do that when it seemed Pamela would rather die than try? She's been dead for eleven years, and you still act like a child!"_

"_You bastard! Don't you dare bring her into this!" She shouted, pointing her fingers towards him and unleashed two powerful laser jets of golden light. There was a groan of pain from within the helmet as smoke began to pour from the black robe. It wasn't long before what happened to Daniel happened to her, and her attack was snuffed out with a wave of the abyss._

_But Melinda was ready. She flicked her wrists in his direction and blew him to pieces, charging through his particles as they flew apart and rushing to her downed brother, trying to help him to his feet. He had the least experience in the family when it came to fighting demons, having always been coddled for being the youngest. He hadn't built the resistance all Halliwells had to getting thrown through furniture. "Are you okay?"_

"_Yeah… My head hurts though." Melinda looked at the back of his head and instantly had to keep her facial expression in check. She looked down at the table wreckage and saw the remains of a pewter potion bowl, covered in his brother's blood. "Mel, watch out!"_

_She looked up just in time to see the particles reform, with the Source now towering over both of them as they struggled to their feet. "Enough of your parlor tricks, witch! I tire of your antics!" He raised one hand and a fireball bloomed in his hand, the cage-like structure of the sphere spinning viciously before he threw it towards the both of them._

"_Fireball!" She yelled, causing the sailing fireball to be called to her own hand in a swirl of orbs for her to hurl right back at him. Unfortunately, this had only been a distraction, for the Source had conjured another fireball in his other hand and threw it just as she threw the first one. The projectile plowed into her chest, throwing her back across the room to crash into a dresser, falling to the floor in a shower of glass and wood while the Source stumbled back from his own attack._

_It was at this moment Chris and Emma made their return. It was chaos. As Emma ran toward her not moving sister, Chris threw his arm outwards towards the Source, sending him careening back into a large pile of antique furniture that both broke his fall and made it worse. This was getting too complicated. With one final menacing laugh, he exploded in a plume of bright flames and retreated to the Underworld, while Emma wept and wept for the sister had lost, holding onto Melinda as if it would stop her warmth from slowly fading away._

* * *

_He stood on the edge of death. He could hear his minions being vanquished behind him. He knew it wouldn't be long until the six witches caught up with him. With their spread of powers, even the one hundred demons he had brought to protect himself hadn't lasted long, the terrain of the afterlife being the only thing that really stopped him from getting caught by them a few minutes ago. That and the never-ending slew of demons who were ready to fall into the pit of black orbs below for him._

_The Source stood on the very spot the Charmed Ones had stood twenty five years ago, looking out onto the beautiful plains of flowers, the river that traveled to the horizon, and the disconcerting blue disc that hung suspended the air, wreathed in black smoke. The beauty and softness of the whole place made him want to leave immediately, but this was the only way to get the power he needed, as walking into Hell as a demon would have been risky, even if it would have felt more like home._

_The demon king began to chant Latin, holding his arms out wide as, against their will, all the stray orbs began to flow towards him. There was movement behind his back, and before the evil being knew it, he was sent to his knees when an athame penetrated his shoulder. He looked over his shoulder to see the eldest Halliwell child, in his thirties now, glaring down upon him with loathing, "You…"_

"_Surprise." Chris said back, his face expressionless as Lorna and his cousins stepped out of the portal behind him, surrounding the Source and looking down upon him. Emma and Daniel seemed to be relishing the demon's pain the most, having never got over the fact that this filth had taken their sister away from them. "There's a reason Omega was vanquished all those years ago. You want to know why?"_

_As if on queue, Adam and Eve arrived before the bowing darkness in a swathe of pearly white orbs, ready to use their power over the lost souls and turn them against the Source, vanquishing him for his greed and stupidity. "No." Chris said calmly to them, raising his hand. "He's ours." With that, the six of them began to chant together._

"_Prudence, Penelope, Patricia, Melinda, Astrid, Pamela, Wyatt, and Grace, Halliwell witches stand strong beside us, vanquish this evil from time and space!"_

_Flames had gathered around the ancient demon as they had chanted, completely consuming him on the climax and obliterating him within seconds. Orbs began to fly around him, ready to take another into the abyss and throw him down to where he belonged when the fire eventually blew upwards in a mushroom cloud of flames, sending a shockwave through the realm and making the orbs scatter before he was finally destroyed._

_It was over now._

* * *

Faith's eyes moved underneath her eyelids as she continued to dream vividly into the future. The amulet in her hands was one that she had sneakily taken from Pamela's neck when her big cousin had been holding her earlier, and with it, she saw every single event that lay in store for her family. Every death, every birth, every tear, every smile. She saw it all as if she was standing there. But would she remember any of it? No. Too young. Far too young to even remember, let alone understand everything that she had seen. She would get a slight feeling of déjà vu when these events actually happened to her, but like every person, she would brush it off as a weird feeling and continue to live, unaware that she had seen time unfold before her. 

"There's my amulet, you little thief!" Pamela hissed with mock anger as she moved toward her sleeping cousin on the living room couch, gently prying it out of her tiny hands and putting it back around her neck. Leaning down, she stroked Faith's chestnut locks with a smile and leaned in to whisper in her ear, "It actually makes your powers stronger, but don't tell anyone."

Getting back to her full height, Pamela walked into the hallway and took a deep breath. She had no idea what she would do now; and that thought alone made her heart beat faster. She could so anything she wanted, be anything she wanted, and nothing would be there to stop her. Despite the fact that Pamela knew demons would eventually come back with a vengeance, she would never regret being born a witch. For the secret of being a witch was family, and how the magic that they all shared created unbreakable bonds that would last forever. She wouldn't a change a thing. She felt like she could see for miles around her without even moving. It was exhilarating to know that you didn't need to fear that every breath would be your last.

Frowning, she realized that the front door had been left open. Pamela rolled her eyes at her aunts' forgetfulness, as they had come in from the outside porch and were now gossiping heatedly in the kitchen instead. With a small laugh and a smile, she raised her hand and flicked her fingers into the air in front of her. Swept up in her telekinetic power, the door began to move forward, before gently swinging closed with a soft click…

**THE END**

* * *

_Well, folks. That's it. If you guys want to know anything else about the trilogy, you can always ask in the website. The story of these characters is over, so you can ask anything you want, and I'll answer. I could only fit so much into Faith's premonition. So yeah, if you're still curious, take a gander over to the site that's linked to in my profile._

_What's next for me? Well, I honestly don't know. I think I'm done writing for the Charmed fandom, but I'm sure you guys will see me in another fandom. I have many. A very wise person once told me to never stop writing, so I'll have to do something if I want to keep my talent sharp. I hope you all enjoyed this series. And to those of you far in the future who have found this series by chance and have just finished it (If that even happens.), I hope you enjoyed it also and am sorry you weren't around when I was in the midst of writing. I'm sure I would have loved to have your support._

_Thank you._


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